The Girl of Steel and the Silver Speedster
by mysteryman10000
Summary: Supergirl is a hero. A beacon of hope for the people of National City and the world. But when tragedy strikes, she learns that her heart isn't as unbreakable as the rest of her. In her darkest hour, when she questions her very humanity, who will be the hero that saves her? Will the darkest speedster in the multiverse be the light of hope for Kara Danvers? Can they save each other?
1. Chapter 1

Harry Potter is the property of J. K. Rowlings and Supergirl the CW. I own nothing and I don't make any money from this story.

Prologue: He is DEFINITELY not the Flash

"W-what are we gonna do?"

That was the question on Alex Danvers mind as she put her phone in her pocket. She had just lost contact with her girlfriend Maggie who was under attack at the Police Department. Their home, National City, was currently being invaded by a race of aliens called Daxamites. Who last night had parked a fleet of spaceships in the sky above their city and minutes ago had opened fire and began transporting troops into the streets.

Standing in the nerve center of the Department of Extra-Normal Operations, the resident technical genius and super fan of all things alien was Winslow Schott Jr., known to his friends as Winn. He had been trying to monitor what was happening in National City in an attempt to coordinate the efforts to defend their home. But was stalled as a broadcast appeared on every computer and digital device in the city. It was a message from the leader of the Daxamites, Queen Rhea, proclaiming this planet to be New Daxam and that they come in peace.

Winn had just turned from his terminal, reporting the crash of their satellite monitoring network to Alex, to ask that most important question. 'What _are_ we going to do?' Alex wondered, as the situation seemed to be spiraling out of control.

Before Alex could even finish the thought, sudden bursts of light on the upper catwalk preceded the arrival of Daxamite soldiers inside the DEO. Another burst of light not one second later, brought one more soldier landing on top of the central table. Alex and Winn, who had been standing right at the edge of the table, suddenly found themselves not two feet from an armed and hostile alien invader.

"No, no." Exclaimed a suddenly alarmed Winn.

But in the split second it took for the Daxamite to aim his weapon at them, Alex had already drawn her sidearm and fired a shot of blue energy right into the chest of the soldier. At point blank range, even the body armor favored by the Daxamites didn't offer much protection.

Sparks began flying as the other soldiers in the room quickly began firing on all DEO agents who didn't react as swiftly as Alex. Grabbing Winn (the only unarmed person in the room) by the front of his shirt and pulling him under the table for cover. Most likely saving his life.

Alex looked around the room and quickly assessed the situation. Caught completely by surprise, the DEO agents were falling like flies.

With their director J'onn J'onzz currently out of action, as the number two agent at the DEO Alex was in charge. Falling into the role she had been trained for she assumed command of the situation.

"Everybody evacuate!" She shouted.

"Go, go." She urged Winn who was still crouching behind the central table. Gesturing for him to make his way away from the weapons fire and towards the nearest exit. Heeding her instructions Winn made it two steps before turning back to grab his portable tablet terminal off the circular table he had just been crouching behind. Knowing that if they were going to mount any sort of counter offensive they would need access to the DEO's alien database.

"Supergirl we are under attack." Alex shouted knowing the communicator in her ear would pick it up over all the noise and weapons fire.

Supergirl was the name of the DEO's alien celebrity and recruiting poster girl (if clandestine government organizations had recruitment poster). She is also one of the last survivors of a race known as Kryptonians, and under the light of earths yellow sun was one of the most power individuals on the planet. As well as the self appointed protector of National City and all who lived there.

She is also known as Kara Danvers. Alex's adopted little sister and her favorite person in the world.

When Kara was a little girl her planet Krypton was dying. Her parents put her and her baby cousin Kal-El into spaceships before their planets destruction and sent them to earth in an effort to save their lives.

Unfortunately for Kara, her pod was knocked off course and she became trapped in a dimensional prison known as the Phantom Zone. The less said about that place the better.

By the time her pod finally made it to earth her cousin Kal-El had already grown up to become the earth's mightiest protector: Superman. He placed Kara with the Danvers family in an effort to give her a normal childhood like him. And for several years Kara endeavored to live her life as fully, but also as normally, as possible.

As Supergirl, she is the DEO's most prominent figure, and their most cheerful and optimistic agent. For almost two years now she has helped the DEO, alongside her sister Alex, protect the world from alien threats. But as Kara, she is a reporter for CatCo Worldwide Media, and the former assistant and protege of the queen of media herself: Cat Grant.

She is also the girlfriend of Mon-El the prince of Daxam.

Mon-El arrived on earth several months ago after his pod crashed in National City. After Krypton exploded and its remnants rained down on Daxam, his home planet had been rendered uninhabitable. Believing himself to be the sole survivor of his species Mon-El began to carve out a life for himself on earth. And despite a few cultural misunderstandings and character flaw driven mistakes, that made Kara almost want to strangle him, he had found a home for himself.

However, that was nearly ruined by the arrival of his parents. In helping Kara and the DEO break up an alien trafficking ring, he had come to the attention of some of Daxam's allies. Who quickly reported his location to the king and queen.

After failing to drive a wedge between Kara and Mon-El in a ploy to make him leave the life he had built on earth, Mon-El's father agreed to take their ship and leave the planet in peace. Unknown to Mon-El, Kara, and the DEO, Queen Rhea was not content to leave her son behind, and had since then had been working in secret on a means of bring the other survivors of Daxam to the earth. After murdering her husband the king for what she perceived as a grievous betrayal.

Which brought about their current situation.

"I've evacuated the DEO." Alex continued.

"Hang on I'm almost there." Kara responded. One arm stretched out in front of her as she flew as fast as she could. Pushing her super speed to the limit in an effort to arrive in time to help.

"There's no time."

"Alright I'll meet you outside." Kara replied.

Realizing what her sister meant Alex fired another shot at a Daxamite soldier charging her position and began to run toward the far side of the room and the balcony that overlooked the city. Quickly dropping to one knee and sliding under the weapons fire of another soldier attempting to stop her, Alex jumped back to her feet and ran full throttle towards her only chance at escape.

With more soldiers teleporting in behind her, she knew the chances of making it over the edge without getting shot were slim. Seeing a hole in the concrete railing around the balcony, Alex leapt into the open air. Before gravity completely took hold she twisted mid jump, brought her sidearm around to the pursuing soldiers and fired a shot right into the middle of them. Before the edge of the balcony obscured her line of sight, Alex was able to see that her shot caught her target dead center in the chest plate sending him sliding halfway back across the room she had just sprinted across.

Flailing her arms and legs as she rapidly descended the skyscraper, she was able to turn to face the oncoming ground. From her left Alex could see the red and blue blur of her sister barreling to her rescue before she met her end on the pavement below. But had she looked to her right she would have seen the blue and white circle of light of a breach in the multiverse down the street. More importantly the sudden burst of silver lightning that shot out of it.

'This is gonna be close.' Alex thought.

Just as her sister was almost between her and the fire truck on the street below her, a bolt of silver lightning seemed to travel from the street, up onto the fire truck, and spring to Alex before Kara could touch her. Before she was even aware of what was happening Alex felt a sudden lurch in the pit of her stomach, then the feeling like being inside a wind tunnel and then she was back on the balcony she had just jumped off.

Kara flew up and was at her side a second later. "Alex wh-"

Kara didn't get to ask her question before her sister spun towards the corner of the balcony and keeled over. Momentarily stunned by this sudden action Kara waited for Alex to finish gagging before trying to address her again. "Are you okay?" She asked as she placed her hand on her sister's shoulder to steady her.

Wiping her mouth on her sleeve Alex turned to Kara, "yeah, I think so."

"Okay, then maybe you can tell me what just happened?"

"What do you mean what just happened?" Alex responded, looking around at the place she had just left. "And why did you bring me back up here?"

"That's just it Alex, I didn't bring you back up here." Exclaimed Kara. Concerned over what had just transpired.

"What are you talking... Wait, why aren't we being attacked." Alex asked, shifting gears mid sentence.

"Attacked?" Kara questioned, stumbling over the sudden change in the conversation.

"Yeah, attacked. I just evacuated the building because dozens of Daxamite soldiers were storming the DEO. And they were right behind me when I jumped over the ledge. They should be all over us right now."

Seeing her point, Kara turned back to face the inside of the build to be confronted by something truly bizarre. Of the soldiers who teleported into the DEO half of them were on the ground either unconscious or worse. All of them with severe gouges in their armor and lacerations on their arms and chests almost like some one had slashed at each of them several times with a knife.

The soldiers still standing seemed to be trying to attack what looked like a bolt of silver lightning flashing from one end of the room to the other. Engaging various soldiers at random. Presumably in an attempt to keep them off balance.

"Is that a speedster?" Alex asks as they move further into the command room. Watching the devastation of the Daxamite warriors as they failed to mount a defense against this unforeseen enemy. One soldier on the catwalk overlooking the room was trying to get a bead on their new opponent but only managed to miss and shoot one of his own men as the lightning moved in front of him. Before traveling up the stairs to take his weapon and whack him over the head with it. Sending him tumbling over the railing down to the floor below before going back to attacking the other soldiers still standing.

"Your friend the Flash couldn't have picked a better time to come for a visit. We could sure use the help." Alex stated. Suddenly much calmer in light of her sister being here and the fact that the Daxamites were to preoccupied fighting off a lightning storm to even realize they were there.

Kara however, didn't share her sisters enthusiasm in light of one glaring problem.

"I don't think thats the Flash." Kara expressed her uncertainty.

"What do ya mean? Why not?" Alex questioned, trepidation entering her voice over this statement from her sister.

Kara couldn't blame Alex for not understanding. As far as she knew the only person who could move as fast as her cousin was Barry Allen, the Flash. A speedster from earth-1 in the multiverse who had accidentally jumped to their earth about a year ago and helped to apprehend two dangerous meta-humans, Livewire and Silver Banshee. But Alex had been on the run with J'onn from the DEO at the time and had never had the pleasure of meeting Barry, though she had certainly heard a lot about him after he left. Barry had appeared again just after thanksgiving to ask for her help with an alien invasion on his own earth. Kara had been happy to help, but Alex stayed behind and thus never got the chance to meet Barry, or his friends and see them in action.

Her doubts about this being her friend were caused by what she was seeing. First there was what was done to the Daxamites. For all his resolve to fight the good fight, Barry was a kind person and a gentle soul. He might not have a problem punching his enemies until they were unconscious, but he would never cause some of the damage she was seeing here.

Second, was the lightning that was still zipping around the room. It was silver. When Barry ran he left a trail of yellow lightning in his wake, not silver.

But most unusual of all was the fact that Kara couldn't see the speedster that was doing this. "What do you mean you can't see him." Her sister asked after stating this fact. "You mean this speedster is too fast for even you to follow?" Alex exclaimed with equal parts admiration and alarm of an unknown speedster her sister apparently couldn't keep up with.

"No, I can follow the lightning just fine." Kara clarified. "I mean I literally can't see the speedster in front of it."

"What do you mean? That he's invisible." She exclaimed with incredulity.

"Yeah actually thats exactly what I'm saying."

"An invisible speedster," Alex mused. "Now I have seen everything."

"Technically you haven't actually seen him yet." Kara proclaimed with some humor. Finally taking her eyes away from the battle in front of her as the last Daxamite went down. Turning to her sister, Alex was about to admonish her for making jokes at a time like this, when they were both distracted by shouting behind them. One of the unconscious Daxamites they had passed on the way in had apparently woken up and was now point a weapon at them.

Alex drew her sidearm from its holster as she turned to face the new threat. Kara moved in front of her in an effort to shield Alex from any lethal fire when the soldier abruptly went ridged. He dropped his weapon as his arms fell slack at his side and his feet left the ground as he slowly rose in the air. Kara and Alex were both stunned by this until a figure began to materialize in front of them.

It was the speedster. Or at least, Kara assumed it was judging by the suit it was wearing. It seemed to be the polar opposite of her friend Barry. Where his suit was bright red with gold lightning bolts around his waist, arms and legs. This speedster seemed to prefer the darkest black, with bands of silver. Barry also left his eyes and mouth exposed, this speedster didn't seem to have an inch of exposed skin. Even his eyes were blocked by some kind of white lenses so Kara couldn't even tell what color his eyes were. And unlike Barry, who wore his white and gold lightning emblem on his chest, this speedster had no such symbol. The closest he had was a silver necklace with what looked like animal claws hanging from it. Bringing to mind the totem necklace worn by Amaya (a.k.a. Vixen of team Legends).

This speedster was at the moment staring at Kara and Alex while holding the Daxamite soldier over his head with one arm. A moment later he tossed the man aside. They watched as the body came to a stop against the wall. Alex and Kara both noticed the blood stains and puncture holes in his armor. Turning back to the mystery speedster they could see blood dripping from what looked like metal spikes on his fingertips.

Kara couldn't seem to take her eyes off the man before them. But Alex quickly looked back at the other soldiers and assessed them with a more critical eye. Now taking notice that all of the lacerations on each body ran parallel to each other, and that they were about finger width apart she came to a startling conclusion.

'They're not knife wounds. They're claw marks.'

Turning back to face this possible new threat Alex only had a moment to stare before he once again turned invisible and a quick flash of lightning out the window signaled his departure.

Hoping for some kind of explanation as to who that was and what just happened, Alex turned to meet the eyes of her sister. Lifting her eyebrows in a silent prompt for Kara to say something.

"He is _definitely_ not the Flash."


	2. Chapter 2: I am Paladin

Harry Potter is the property of J. K. Rowlings and Supergirl the CW. I own nothing and I don't make any money from this story.

Chapter 2: I am Paladin

An hour had passed since the strange happenings at the DEO. All agents who had survived the assault on their headquarters had reconvened at a local bar frequented by the cities alien residents. A favorite of the Danvers sisters and their closest friends.

The various agents were currently moving between the tables and booths trying to take stock of every resource they had left to use. Winn was busy setting up computer terminals so they could continue gathering intelligence on the situation in National City. Meanwhile, Kara and Alex were dealing with something much more personal.

The adopted siblings were currently standing over the bed J'onn J'onzz the leader of the DEO, the sole surviving green martian and the sisters surrogate father figure.

J'onn had been a major influence on both of their lives. Not only training both sisters to operate as agents, but he was the one who had recruited Alex into the organization to begin with.

J'onn had originally come to earth as a refugee after his species, the green Martians were wiped out by the more aggressive white martians on his home world. This included the deaths of J'onn's wife and two daughters.

With the death of his family he fled Mars and came to earth to start a new life. But had unintentionally attracted the attention of the DEO, at the time a new organization. Led by Hank Henshaw, a xenophobe of the highest order, they attempted to police alien activity the world over. But thanks to the intervention of Jeremiah Danvers, J'onn was able to escape and begin living on earth.

By posing as Hank Henshaw.

At the time J'onn believed Henshaw to be dead. So he felt comfortable assuming his life. And as the head of the DEO, he was able to make sure that they didn't unjustly persecute any harmless alien refugees. After he was outed to the world as an alien himself, he spent several weeks hiding from his own agents. Until he helped Kara battle the Fort Rozz escapees and save the world from Myriad. For that he received a full pardon from the president and was reinstalled as the leader of the DEO.

When Rhea began the invasion J'onn tried to stop her. Which led to him lying on the cot before Kara and Alex, back in his green Martian form completely unresponsive to anything going on around him.

"Do we know what Rhea did to him?" Kara fretted.

Letting out a sigh of frustration, Alex looked down at J'onn and pondered how to respond. "His vitals are erratic." She hedged. "It's like his neurons are working over time. He's comatose on the outside, but on the inside..." Alex stopped there because she really had no idea how else to describe it.

"Will he wake up?" Kara asked.

'That is a very good question.' Alex thought. Wisely keeping her musings to herself. Not want to make this situation seem worse than it already was. Alex was saved from having to respond by a welcome arrival.

"Look who found us." Winn said, drawing the attention of the sisters.

Walking in behind Winn was James Olsen. Decked out in the protective gear, with his helmet in his hand, of his superhero alter ego Guardian. He had been out fighting in the streets trying to save as many lives as he could. But his timing couldn't have been better. They needed to regroup and figure out what to do next. Not just to fight the Daxamites but to find a way to drive them out of National City and more importantly, off the earth.

"James, I am so glad you're ok." Kara quickly walked over to hug her friend. Relieved that he was alright.

"Yeah me too. Its a war zone out there." James told her as he returned the embrace.

Kara hadn't been thrilled when James decided he wanted to make a difference in the city. She didn't believe somebody without superpowers, alien technology or at least government training should be fighting battles against alien criminals. Kara wasn't able to talk James out of it, but with no way to force him too stop, she simply resigned herself to being there to watch his back whenever she could. Though it remained a point of tension between them.

"Daxamite troops are beaming down from everywhere, setting up check points, arresting resisters," he continued as Alex walked over to hug him as well. "It's almost like they are instituting their own martial law."

"Yeah, not to mention the full on Independence Day going on with the mothership hovering over the city." Winn added, gesturing over his head to help illustrate his point in his typical Winn fashion of gesticulation and movie references.

"Mon-El is on that ship." Kara cut in. Bringing the focus to her boyfriend who was currently being held prisoner by his own mother aboard the Daxamite flagship. "Rhea took him. She took Lena too."

Lena Luthor is the sister of Alexander 'Lex' Luthor. The greatest enemy of her cousin Superman. She is also the head of L-Corp, the multi-billion dollar company originally named after her brother. But after it was revealed that he was behind multiple attempts to kill superman, attempts that often led to the deaths of innocent people, he was incarcerated and Lena assumed the CEO position. Her first action was to move the companies headquarters to National City in an effort to gain a fresh start and distance herself from her brothers reputation.

She was also Kara's first interview as a reporter at CatCo. Lena had fully expected Kara to write a hatchet piece about her and her alien detection device. When she didn't it was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

"Have you reached Clark yet?" James inquired. Not only asking about Kara's cousin, the man of steel, but also one of his best friends.

"I called Perry White, he's not at the Daily Planet. He's not at the Fortress of Solitude either." She replied.

"Well maybe Superman is out there right now. Fighting on the streets." Alex said, hoping to shine some light on a dark situation.

"If he is I didn't see him." Exclaimed a National City police officer as she walked in the door.

"Maggie!" Alex ran over to kiss her girlfriend Maggie Sawyer. A kiss Maggie was all to happy to return.

"I'm so glad you're ok."

"I'm so glad that when things look their worst we both thought to run strait to a bar." Maggie replied with a smile. Happy to see that the woman she loved was alive and well. Even happier to see her comment get a laugh out of Alex.

Kara hated to break up the happy reunion. But they needed to get back to the problem in front of them. So gesturing for Winn and James to follow her, she moved closer to Alex and Maggie. "We're all together. Now we can fight back."

It was James who asked the all important question. "Where do we start?"

"Without the DEO mainframe we're flying blind." Winn began.

"Not to mention the Daxamite military patrolling the streets." Maggie continued.

"And J'onns' not here to lead us." Alex piled on.

'How much worse could things get?' Kara pondered. "Maybe I could be of service." Came from the again open door. 'Oh, that's how much.' Kara realized as Lillian Luthor, Lena's mother walked into the room.

Alex, Maggie, James and every DEO agent in the room drew their weapons and pointed them at her. Lillian wasn't like her daughter. She, like her son Lex, saw aliens as a threat. All aliens, Daxamite and Kryptonian, innocent and guilty, parent and child all of them were a threat in her eyes. And she and her organization of like minded followers, referring to themselves as Project Cadmus, had tried to commit mass genocide on National Cities alien immigrants on more than one occasion. Safe to say she is not a friend to anybody in the room.

"What, not happy to see me?"

No one made any attempt to respond. Everybody in the room just continued to point their various weapons at Lillian, who didn't appear concerned in the least. She placed a metal case about the size of a one gallon milk jug on the table next to her.

"You people are so predictable." Lillian drawled, sounding almost bored with the current situation.

"Put your hands above your head." Alex ordered advancing on Lillian, gun pointed at her heart. Or where her heart should be. It was up for debate if Lillian actually had one.

"No," was her dismissive response as she took off her gloves. Completely ignoring the many weapons pointed at her.

"You made a mistake coming here." Kara declared. Making her distaste for Lillian apparent.

"Oh I find it as distasteful as you do Supergirl. But I need your help." Lillian said, looking right at Kara and continuing to ignore Alex who still had a weapon pointed at her. "And you need mine."

"Where's my father?" The question came from Alex. Referring to Lillian's kidnapping and imprisoning of her father Jeremiah. After he saved J'onn from the real Hank Henshaw, it was Cadmus who faked both of their deaths and had been holding Jeremiah hostage. So imagine Alex's surprise when Lillian said, "I don't know."

Not believing her, Alex responded, "That's the wrong answer." While raising her gun from Lillian's chest to right under her chin. Implying what would happen if she didn't talk fast.

Lillian merely glanced down at the gun with disinterest before looking back at Alex. "Well its the truth."

"Alright what do you want?" Kara intervened before the situation could get out of hand.

"To take down our common enemy." Lillian began, striding forward with poise as though she were a queen addressing her subjects. "Everything I've warned against has come to pass. The alien invaders have come to destroy our way of life, and claim our planet. Just as I said they would." She finished as she took a seat on a bar stool.

"You could just say 'I told you so." Grumbled Winn, sick of Lillians holier-than-thow attitude already.

"I _did_ tell you so." She emphasized. "And now you can shoot me." Apparently she had finished her little speech. Alex, who was staring Lillian down, just tilted her head as if considering doing just that.

"Or," She started again, clearly on an ego driven role. "We can work together. And we can save our loved ones, and this city."

There were several protests from Maggie, Alex and James. All along the lines of "we got this," and "we'll never work with you." Lillian weathered all of this with barely a twitch.

"Fine," the harpy said rising from the stool that she had perched herself upon. "If that is how you feel then I guess I'm wasting my time."

'That was way to easy.' Kara thought as Lillian pulled her gloves out of her pocket.

"I suppose I will just have to take my chances with the new _hero_ in town."

"What?"

"New hero?"

"What are you talking about."

Came the surprised exclamations from Maggie, Winn and James. Kara and Alex just turned to each other, having a silent conversation as only siblings could. They both knew who she was talking about.

"I'm referring to your new speedy friend." She continued. Turning from their friends, she addressed the sisters instead. "You know who I'm talking about. The man that saved you from your fall and fought every single Daxamite soldier in the DEO alone."

Everybody turned from Lillian to look at the two of them. A million questions clear on their faces. They hadn't had the chance to tell anyone about the mystery speedster yet. It sucks that they had to find out from Lillian of all people, but there are bigger concerns to deal with first.

"How do you know what happened at the DEO?" Alex asked. Ignoring everybody else for the time being.

"After the Daxamite assault on it your HQ was completely abandoned. Once I followed the cities security footage and realized that was where he first appeared I just hacked in remotely and watch what happened." Lillian replied with nonchalance. As if she hadn't just admitted to illegally hacking into city systems and government security in a room full of DEO agents.

"How did you know to even look for him?" Kara questioned.

Lillian just looked at her with disdain. "Really?" She said with no small amount of scorn. As if she was insulted she even had to answer that question. She just shook her head and proceeded to walk behind the bar. Pulling out a remote she pointed it to a nearby flatscreen and turned it on.

The screen showed news coverage of the Daxamite ships as they hovered over the city. Not surprising. Ever since the Daxamites arrived the story had been world news as every city in the world wanted to know what the invaders wanted. And more importantly where they were going next if they conquered National City.

Lillian changed the channel to another stations coverage of the invasion. This one showing the city streets. Civilians were running from soldiers who were firing on anybody trying to resist. Before a bolt of silver lightning shot through the streets. It knocked the Daxamites off their feet and started grabbing civilians and quickly carrying them out of the area. Clearly the speedster hadn't gone to ground like they had after he left the DEO.

Lillian changed the channel again. This time showing what the script at the bottom of the screen said was amateur cellphone footage. It showed a group of about a dozen people gathered together, surrounded by Daxamites, all pointing weapons at them. From off the screen came the same silver lightning. I plowed through the nearest soldiers before it started grabbing civilians. That was the point that a dozen more soldiers started coming out of nearby buildings and started firing.

It was a trap.

The soldiers obviously couldn't see the speedster to aim at him. But with their numbers and firing blind it didn't matter how fast he was, the soldiers were bound to get lucky. And one did.

As the speedster was returning for more civilians, a lucky shot managed to send him flying. The blast obviously damaged whatever cloaking technology he was using because he was suddenly in full view for everybody to see as he landed fifteen yards away. One leg extended behind him and the other beneath him. His arms reaching in front of him with the metal claws on his fingers digging gouges into the concrete to stop him. Looking up from that position he looked less like a man and more like a jungle cat about to pounce.

He charged the wall of soldiers lined up in front of him. In an instant the middle one was sent flying backwards with claw marks on his chest. Then the two on his left and right were sent fly in opposite directions. Then another soldier, and another and another all in a flash of silver lightning. Until all of the soldiers were down and the speedster was left standing before the civilians. Some of them started clapping and cheering. The speedster stood still for a moment, taking this all in, before he became invisible again and started taking them to safety.

Lillian pressed the off button on the remote and turned back to them. "Perhaps he will be a little more open to my help."

"Ok and just who is he? Because that did not look like our buddy the Flash." Said Winn.

"It wasn't." Kara interjected. "We don't know who he is. He just appeared shortly after Alex evacuated the DEO."

"But just in time to save her from falling to her death apparently." Came Maggie's tense reply. Kara wasn't sure what Maggie disliked more, the idea of her girlfriend nearly getting killed, or some unknown speedster being the one to rescue her.

"I would have saved her. He just got to her first." Kara tried to defend herself.

"What else do we know about him? I don't remember the Flash with claws like this guy?" Asked James with some suspicion.

"He's male, about 5'10, 5'11 feet tall with an athletic build. Obviously fit like most speedsters." Alex lectured.

"Hmm tall and athletic." Began Maggie turning to look at Alex. "Should I be jealous Alex?"

"Hey, I was assessing a possible threat. That's all." Alex replied with some humor. Knowing Maggie was just joking. Bringing some much needed levity to their situation.

"As riveting as this is, can we get back to the real issue." Interrupted Lillian. "Can he help with this situation?"

"I'm sure that he could but how do we get in touch with him?" Kara responded. "You saw the trap they set for him. If I fly out and stop him in the streets every Daxamite in the city will converge on us before we can even finish introductions."

"We gotta bring him to us." Came James' statement of the obvious.

"Well how are we supposed to do that." Winn spoke with some doubt. "Its not like I have a speedster dog whistle handy."

"I believe what you need is right here." Lillian walked over to the metal case she left on the table. Kara had forgotten she brought that in with her. Looking around at the others she could see she wasn't the only one.

Opening the case, she revealed something that looked like a next generation solar lamp. "This should do the trick."

"I-I'm sorry," Winn stammered as he moved towards Lillian. Hand raised to indicate the device. "But Cadmus just happens to have a device that will what? Summon a speedster with the push of a button?" After hearing the question out loud the others were just as confused and skeptical.

"It wasn't designed to summon a speedster." Came the curt response. "It was originally designed to attract a metahuman. One you should be familiar with. A miss Leslie Willis."

"LIVEWIRE! Why on earth would you want to attract her." Exclaimed a suddenly alarmed Kara.

"Because she fought you twice and nearly beat you both times. And despite what she has become, she is still human." She explained. "A metahuman granted, but still human. And I thought that she might be useful in the long run." Clearly when given the choice, she preferred the company of metahumans over aliens. No surprise there. But in typical Lillian fashion, she expressed that with a comment that was equal parts compliment and insult.

"Yeah, if you're hoping to try to turn Livewire into your own personal weapon, I should warn you its been done already." Referencing the last time Leslie escaped custody. She had been kidnapped by a man who hoped to use her as a battery to create other electrical powered metahumans.

"I'm aware of that Mr. Schott." She didn't look pleased at being interrupted. "That's why Cadmus never bothered to use the device after her last escape. We didn't believe she would be very receptive to our offer at the time."

No one had anything to say to that.

"But this device is designed to generate a field of static interference that will cover the entire city." She lectured. "Harmless and relatively unnoticeable to the average person. However, somebody with electrical powers like Ms. Willis would find it very hard to ignore. And would be able to follow the field to its source."

"O-oh I see where you're going with this." Winn's sudden excitement at the possibility of working on an experimental piece of technology apparent to the entire room. "A speedsters cells are bonded with a charged energy field comprised of tachyons, dark matter and a few other exotic particles. That is what makes them a speedster."

"Yes, and with your help I believe we can modify this device to effect the energy given off by a speedster instead." Lillian concluded.

They had finally come to it. It was time to address the elephant that had been in the room ever sense Lillian showed up. Do they take the risk of working with one of their worst enemies in an effort to better their chances of saving their loved ones, or do they tell her to 'get the hell out' and take their chances by themselves.

Every one looked to Kara.

It was her boyfriend and best friend being held hostage on that ship. She was the one with the most to lose. So everybody silently agreed it was her call to make. She didn't trust Lillian. She chafed at being in the same room as her, let alone work with her. She didn't like it, but these were desperate times.

"Winn, get started."

It took less than an hour for Winn and Lillian to modify the device to attract a speedster. James and Maggie wanted to stick around and meet the mystery speedster, and keep an eye on Lillian. But ultimately they needed to get back out on the streets and help people.

Kara and Alex waited quietly while they worked together. Alex had approached Kara twenty minutes after they started working to check if Kara knew what she was doing. Kara tried to reassure her, but the truth was she was just as shaken by the idea of working with Lillian, and Alex could tell.

"Ok, I think we are ready to turn this puppy on." Winn exclaimed turning to where the sisters were standing. "Either of you want to do the honors?"

Lillian, completely ignoring him, flipped the power switch on the base of the device. The look on her face showing just how impatient she was getting.

A clear cylinder in the middle of the device lit up as the sparks began to fly between electrical coils within. The sound of static filled the room as a panel on top of the device began to glow.

Alex counted to five in her head before she saw Winn turn to the door as if waiting for the speedster to walk through it. She got to ten before he began glancing around the room as if he missed the speedster's arrival. And twenty before he turned to behind him to look at them finally breaking his silence.

"Umm, what do we do if this guy doesn't show?"

Whoosh, every piece of paper not held down went flying as the speedster came to a stop between the door and the table where Winn and Lillian had been working. Winn didn't even flinch.

"Never mind." Winn flatly finished. Turning back to look at the speedster in all his black and silver glory.

Seeing Lillian take a step toward him Kara knew she had to act fast. She couldn't risk Lillian making the first inroads with this potential ally.

"Thank you." She said, perhaps a little to loudly. But at least her enthusiastic comment surprised Lillian enough to halt her in place. Striding forward with purpose until she was within arms reach of the speedster. "For saving my sister."

He just looked at her. Or at least Kara thought he was looking at her. It was difficult to tell without being able to see his eyes.

" **Your welcome."** His voice echoed. Kara recognized it as a trick Barry showed her, where a speedster vibrated their vocal cords as they talked. Clearly he didn't trust them, if he was making efforts not to give away anything about himself by disguising his voice.

"I'm Supergirl." She introduced herself, trying to make some kind of connection. "That's Alex," she gestured to her sister behind her. "That's Winn. And that is Lillian." Having finished identifying the others in the room, it was time to bite the bullet. "What's your name?"

An eternity seemed to go by as the speedster continued to stand perfectly still right in front of her. The way he stared at her made Kara wonder if this is what it felt like to others when she used her x-ray vision on them. She was just about to lose hope of working with him when he finally spoke.

 **"** **I am, Paladin."**

Sorry for the delay. I wanted to post this on Friday but this chapter proved harder to write than I expected. Anyway already started on chapter 3. Will hopefully be up on schedule. Have a nice night.


	3. Chapter 3: I'm Not a Hero

Harry Potter is the property of J. K. Rowlings and Supergirl the CW. I own nothing and I don't make any money from this story.

_o0o_

Chapter 3: I'm Not a Hero

It is a beautiful day. The sun is shining down on me. Surrounded by a lush valley cradled by towering mountains. I feel the tips of the tall grass as I hold my arm out to my side. Until a strong but gentle hand takes mine. There is a man standing behind me. I turn to face him. He looks into my eyes with such warmth. He brushes his hand across my cheek. Moving a few stray hairs behind my ear. I tilt my head back as I close the distance between us, and our lips meet. It is a perfect moment.

I look away from him and see we are not alone. Standing a short distance away, wearing the same blue gown she was wearing when I last saw her is my mother. I move towards her. She just smiles at me as I wrap my arms around her. Things couldn't be better.

If only it was real.

Car horns and voices in the distance pull her from her fantasy. She isn't in a picturesque valley. She is floating miles above National City. The wind flutters her cape behind her as she listens to the white noise created by her city. Until a particular sound pierces the night.

Police sirens.

Arms out in front of her Supergirl rockets towards the sound. Guns shots join the sound of sirens. Then the sound of sparks and metal on concrete.

"He's dragging us!"

She knows that voice. Its her sister Alex and she is in trouble.

Supergirl gets there in time to see the back of the truck the police had been chasing open to reveal a mounted mini-gun. And a man in black tactical gear turns it to point at the car containing Alex and Maggie.

"Oh, no." She can hear Alex from where she is speeding towards them.

The man in black aims and pulls the trigger. Only for the bullets to ricochet off the chest of the girl of steel as she lands on the hood of Maggies car, getting between the bullets and her sister.

Grabbing the mini-gun by the barrels Supergirl yanks down and snaps it in two. The man in black quickly moves towards a ladder allowing him to climb on top of the semi-trailer. Supergirl is peripherally aware of Maggie's car being released from the back of the semi-trailer coming to a stop as she lands on the roof to face him.

He draws a stun-baton and charges at Supergirl. Leaning left and right he misses several swings before she startles him by grabbing the baton. Noticing only a slight prickling sensation from the obviously modified high voltage weapon. Still, enhanced or not, she didn't even notice it.

But he did. And the look of surprised panic was the last she saw of him before she sent him flying off the trailer with a super-powered backhand. That is one criminal down, now its time to stop the driver. Especially before he rams that car with a mother and her son inside.

Supergirl quickly jumps down next to the car and stops the truck as it collides with her bare hands. Turning to check on the mother and son, she sees the boy looking at her from the back seat.

"Supergirl, you're the best." He says in thanks. His eyes wide and adoration plain to see on his face.

She doesn't say anything. Just takes off into the air.

"Doesn't even stop for autographs anymore." Maggie says as she looks at Alex.

_o0o_

Striding into the nerve-center of the DEO, Supergirl approaches Winn as he leans casually against the central table. With a smile on his face, he attempts to make a joke to get a laugh from his friend. "Cool car chase. Very fast, very furious."

"Any luck ID'ing the one that got away." She says, all business. Completely ignoring his attempt at humor.

"Still running facial recognition. So far nothing." Winn replies as the smile slips off of his face.

"Anything else we can go on?" J'onn asks as he behind Winn. All business as well.

Kara retrieves a tray of forensic tools from a nearby work station. She raises her right hand revealing blood on her knuckles. "This is his. Winn can you send a sample up to Alex's lab? Maybe his DNA is already in the database."

"Eww, okay." Winn says as he puts on a pair of latex gloves. "This is new and gross."

"I should have cuffed him." Kara says, again ignoring Winn's comments.

"You knocked him a hundred yards into the roof of that SUV." Alex interrupted as she joins the four of them at the table. "Not to mention saving my fiancée and I."

"Yeah and that truck was full of Aluminum tubing. Which certainly doesn't seem like much until, you use it to build and illegal nuclear centrifuge." Winn continues for Alex, seeing that she was trying to raise her sisters spirits.

J'onn, trying to help, builds on what the others were saying. "This is a big win Supergirl."

But, once again, Kara sidesteps all attempts to lift her spirits. "It not a win until they're behind bars."

"Let's get this guy." She says as Winn finishes collect the blood sample from her hand.

Alex watches her go with a forlorn look on her face, desperately wondering how to breach the walls her sister had built around her heart. Alex turned to chase after her in what would probably be one last futile attempt to cheer her up by inviting her to her wedding tasting. Alex was hoping the promise of free hors d'oeuvres to taste and pot stickers to eat for her up coming wedding would be enough get her to spend some time with her only sister.

But before Alex can call out to her, Kara abruptly turns back to face Winn and J'onn again.

"Was he out there tonight?" Kara asks. The flat monotone voice she had been using up till now reinforced with some steel. Her lips set in a thin line. It was apparent to everybody in the room who she was talking about.

The look on J'onn's face never changed. But the quick scrunching of Winn's face showed his disappointment at the change of topic. He had clearly been hoping she would forget to ask that question. But she hadn't forgotten to ask any night for the last several months, so he wasn't sure what had made him so hopeful tonight.

"Winn, was he out there tonight?" She snapped again with more force while crossing her arms in front of her chest. If Kara cared about the quick glance Winn shot at J'onn she didn't show it.

J'onn glanced back at Winn but didn't say anything, which from the stoic Martian was a reply in itself. Winn took that as his consent and turned back to the main monitors. "Yeah he was out there tonight." He said as he picked up his tablet and began pulling up files, knowing Kara would want to see what they had. "He stopped a convenient store robbery and two muggings, one of which was committed by a hellgrammite we now have in custody." He stopped there hoping (praying) that Kara would be satisfied with that alone.

"Did he hurt anybody?"

His prayers went unanswered.

Resigned to the fact that she wasn't going to let this go, Winn pulled up security footage from the convenient store. It showed a man wearing a ski mask, pointing a gun at the teenage clerk behind the counter, and a father/daughter duo about five feet away on their knees near the candy bars. There wasn't any audio but it wasn't needed to grasp the situation. The man in the mask was pointing his gun at the store clerk who was just standing there. They could see that his hands were shaking, but the rest of him was obviously to scared to move.

A fact that was clearly agitating the gun-man.

Frustration mounting, the gun-man turned his weapon towards the father and daughter on their knees. Believing that threatening them would finally get the store clerk to move.

The father who had his arms wrapped around his daughter, moved to block her body from view. The father said something to the gun-man that he clearly didn't like as he began moving towards them gun aimed at the little girl. She couldn't have been more than ten, maybe eleven, years old. And even with half her face turned into her fathers chest, they could still see the tears cascading down her cheeks, and the terrified look on her face.

His agitation, his body language, everything about him was screaming that he was about to shoot. Then a familiar bolt of silver lightning flashes into view, and a black gloved hand is covering the barrel of the gun. A quick spark of light on the video proved the gun-man did try to shoot. However, before he even realized that something stopped him his hand holding the gun was forced behind his back. They could see him shout in pain before Paladin let him go, and he crumpled to the floor.

A flash of silver later and the mans gun was on the counter, the silent alarm was tripped, and Paladin was gone. And the gun-man was left on the floor with five bloody holes in his back, trying to stand up, but his legs weren't moving.

"Paralyzed from the waist down." Winn answered the question he knew was coming.

"Should have stopped him when I had the chance." Kara said with more venom than her friends and family normally heard from her.

"He stopped a criminal and saved three people." J'onn interjected. "He did the right thing Supergirl."

Kara turned to J'onn looking outraged that he would even say something like that. "The right thing? No, no. The right thing would have been to handcuff him. Tie the guy up or knock him unconscious." Kara continued, her anger growing with each word spoken. "No he didn't do the right thing. He left a man paralyzed on the floor. That isn't the right thing. That isn't what a hero does."

Nobody had anything to say to that.

"Winn have you managed to track him yet?"

"Not yet." Winn reluctantly admitted. "But I've got a new idea. I just need a little more time to implement it."

"Well work fast. We've left him alone long enough. Its time to do something about him." Kara said, walking away.

They watched her go for a moment before Winn turned to sit at his desk and do as Kara asked. J'onn quietly stepped out of the room. But Alex still had something to say to her sister.

"Kara wait." Kara stopped and turned to face her sister. "I think you might be judging him to harshly."

Again, Kara looks incredulously at her sister. "Am I the only one who saw the paralyzed man on that video?" She asked while pointing back at the screen they had previously been watching. "You can't honestly tell me that you think those were the actions of a hero."

"Yes." Alex began. "I don't know," she backtracked quickly. "No. You're right." Alex said holding her hands up placatingly as her sister looked at her in confusion. "You're right, those aren't the actions of a hero. But I understand why he did what he did."

"What are you talking about?" Kara asked. She couldn't see where her sister was going with this. When Alex started talking she wasn't sure even Alex knew where she was going with this conversation.

"Kara, in a few weeks I'm going to be a married woman." She tried to explain. "Someday I'm going to be a mom. And if a man with a gun ever threatens my child, he will be lucky if _all_ I do is paralyze him from the waist down."

Kara could see the look of conviction on her sister's face. She knew how her sister felt about kids being threatened. So she knew that Alex meant what she said.

"And you're right, those aren't the actions of a hero. But I don't think that makes him a monster either." Alex concluded. But Kara wasn't willing to budge on this.

"That's different Alex. He isn't a parent protecting his child." Kara replied with some heat. "He is a vigilante who has taken it upon himself to play judge, jury and in some cases executioner. He needs to be stopped."

Alex brings her hands together in front of her face, looking almost as if she was praying for patience. But she was trying to gather her thoughts, and maybe some strength, before she said what she was going to say. She had tried to broach this with Kara several times in the last few months, but Kara would always slam the breaks on every time. But Alex knew that sooner or later she wouldn't be able to ignore this anymore. "We both know that his methods aren't why you hate him."

"I don't have time for this." She immediately injected, as she turned and walked toward the balcony to take off. "When we find him, we are going to stop him Alex."

Alex could only stand there and watch her sister walk away from this topic again.

_o0o_

A few minutes later, on the deserted roof of a nearby skyscraper everyone's favorite green martian landed with a metal case in his hands. Setting the case down and removing the lid on the case revealed the speedster beacon. Flipping the switch on the side J'onn watched as it lit up.

He waited for about ten seconds before a flash of silver light and a whooshing sound behind him signaled the arrival of the speedster.

" **Turn that thing off**." Said a very aggravated speedster.

"I'm sorry." J'onn says and immediately does as requested. Though the speedster didn't make it sound like a request. "I know that you find it uncomfortable."

" **Uncomfortable? It makes my skin burn. I imagine this is what it feels like to lie down in a bed of lye**. Said a very annoyed Paladin.

"Well I apologize for that." J'onn replied. "But perhaps if I had another means of contacting you we could avoid this...uncomfortableness."

" **I'm not getting a phone. They are to easily tracked**." J'onn knew that response was coming. It was the same excuse that he gave every time J'onn suggested it.

And he was right. Which is why J'onn never really pushed the issue.

" **You could give me a DEO communicator. Certainly would make it easier when you want to send me on an assignment. By the way, you're welcome for apprehending that hellgramite for you."** He continued **. "And thanks for that tip on avoiding Supergirl by the way. If you hadn't warned me about what part of the city she was in, we may have run into each other.** "

That caused J'onn to pause for a moment and consider how he should respond to that. In the end, he decided to just move right past it. "I'm not yet ready to make your involvement in DEO operations public knowledge." J'onn hedged. "But I can't help feeling as though we will require your help sometime in the near future. Which is why I'm giving you this." That's when J'onn took something out of his pocket and threw it to Paladin. Easily catching it, he looked down at the device in his hand and realized it was a GPS tracking device.

"That is your hotline to the DEO. When there is an assignment that I think you can help with, I will plant a tracker keyed to this receiver on one of the agents. Once it turns on, all you have to do is-."

" **Run in and do whatever it takes to stop the bad guys who are threatening innocent people**." He interrupted. " **And of course, try to keep a low profile because most of the DEO doesn't really approve of my methods**."

'That's putting it mildly.' J'onn hesitated before getting to the real reason behind this meeting. "That's actually why I called you here tonight."

Paladin, who had been standing stoically in the same spot since he had arrived, crossed his arms and prepared for what he suspected was coming.

"I heard about your exploits tonight." He began. "You know, I applaud your results. But I also take issue with your methods. I keep trying to defend you to the others at the DEO but it would be a lot easier if your methods weren't so extreme."

" **Why do I get the feeling there is only one employee at the DEO that you have really had to defend me from?** " J'onn knew that even though it was worded like a question, he wasn't really expecting an answer. This was just another disagreement they were repeating.

"Supergirl did make a point I am having trouble reconciling: your actions are hardly those of a hero." J'onn redirected.

" **I'm not a hero.** " His eyebrows shot up at that declaration. Proof that even J'onn's stoic demeanor could be cracked.

 **"I haven't considered myself a hero in years**." He continued. " **A hero does what they or others consider to be the right or moral course of action. I do what I consider to be necessary**." Here he uncrossed his arms and held his hands up as if to placate J'onn. Like he was trying to quell a protest that J'onn had no intention of making.

" **I am neither proud of this, nor ashamed. Its just the way I am**." Paladin concluded.

J'onn wasn't sure how to respond to that. As a former soldier in the war against the White Martians, and as a DEO agent, he was familiar with doing what was necessary, even if it was morally ambiguous. The time he ordered Alex to apprehend Kara after she first started appearing as Supergirl being a fine example.

But since he had started working with Kara she had forced him to reevaluate many of his personal views. First and for most, the lines he was willing to cross and the lengths he was willing to go to avoid crossing them.

Not knowing how to respond to such a declaration, J'onn chose to simply move past it. "We may need to bring Mr. Schott in on your involvement in ongoing DEO assignments." J'onn insisted. "Kara has had him working on various means of tracking your movements for months. Whatever methods you employ to keep yourself hidden have worked thus far, but sooner or later he will succeed."

Paladin's quickly relaxing body language indicated that he wasn't to concerned. " **I doubt that. Tracking a regular speedster is incredibly difficult. Tracking a speedster with my unique abilities, nearly impossible**." J'onn didn't know what he meant by unique abilities, but that was neither here nor there at the moment. His tone wasn't one of a man bragging. He was simply stating what he believed to be fact.

"Be that as it may, I have learned never to underestimate Mr. Schott's innovative thinking. I would suggest that you do the same." He concluded.

Sensing the finality of that statement, he concluded it was time to leave. With an expected whooshing sound and a brief burst of silver lightning, he was gone.

_o0o_

He loved this feeling.

Even before he became a speedster he loved the feeling of flying through the air on a broomstick at insane speeds. Steep dives and complex aerobatics used to be his favorite pass times. That and his various adventures had earned him a plethora of titles (some good, some not to good). But the only one he actually believed he deserved was "adrenaline junky."

Ever since he became a speedster he hasn't needed a broom to enjoy this feeling. The sound of the air roaring in his ears as pushes his legs to move faster. His feet barely make contact with the ground for more than a fraction of a second before he propels himself forward. If not for the split second to remind him that its there, he would swear he was flying.

And the lightning, god the lightning. It felt like a thousand adrenaline rushes all at once. To feel it coursing through your body, to posses it. No, to be a _part_ of the lightning. It made him feel invincible. Its a feeling he could just dive into and let the rest of the world fall away.

'These moments are what let me feel like myself again.'

His pleasant thoughts are interrupted by a quiet beeping coming from a pocket near his waist. He stops and quickly retrieves the GPS tracker that J'onn gave him to see that a signal was coming from outside the city. He immediately started moving towards it.

It took him minutes to cross the city, seconds to search the army base he arrived at, and only a moment to take in the scene before he acted. Supergirl was there, standing in the middle of the room. In front of her was what appeared to be a Daxamite ship, with weapons armed. And to her left entering from a side door are two soldiers with assault rifles. And between the soldiers and the ship are what appears to be two pulses of energy weapons fire heading strait for them.

Immediately he moves to get them out of the way. Get them to safety. One he grabs and moves to cover behind some nearby metal crates. But by that time the weapons fire had already struck the other soldier. It sent him flying back to collide with a metal drum and a black burn mark the size of a pie plate on his chest.

He moved to check on the soldier. Thankfully he is alive and conscious. He heard the high pitched hum of a high powered laser and prepared to grab the downed soldier, injured or otherwise, and get him to safety. Luckily he didn't have too. He was relieved to look up and realize the hum was coming from Supergirl using her heat vision to destroy the weapon on the ship.

Then she turned to check on the soldiers and spotted him. The look on her face twisted into one of controlled rage. For a moment he thought she would use her heat vision on him. Instead she looked down at the soldier he was tending to, then back up at him before some of her rage cools and moves to check on the soldier as well.

"Hey, can you hear me? How do you feel?" She said as she examined the soldier. Paladin kept one hand on his shoulder to keep him from moving and the other hand holding the soldiers hand. Providing what emotional support he could while Supergirl spoke to the man. The way she was running her eyes over his chest made him think she was x-raying the soldier. Paladin wondered for a moment what that must feel like.

"Ok, good news, no internal bleeding or broken bones. You're going to be ok." She told him with what was clearly the best smile she could muster under the circumstances. Then she looked up at him and the barely controlled rage returned. "What are _you_ doing here?"

" **I came to help**." That was about as direct an answer as he could give and still be honest. He needed to tread carefully here. If he gave the wrong details and she realized his involvement with the DEO he would unintentionally throw J'onn under the bus.

Thankfully Kara didn't press the issue. Not that issue at least. "I'm not going to let you leave here. I'm taking you into DEO custody and you will answer for your crimes."

Paladin wasn't that concerned, she would have to catch him before she could arrest him. And even with her super speed, he was confident that he could out run her if he had to.

Fortunately he didn't have to. A second later, Supergirl looked to her left. Either she was worried the wooden crates on the other side of the room contained enemy mercenaries about to open fire on them, or she was listening to something with her super-hearing. She turned back to look at him with a rather conflicted look on her face. Guessing she didn't want to leave him, and more importantly the wounded soldier.

" **Go**." He ordered her. " **I'll look after him. And you can arrest me some other time. I'll give you plenty of chances, I promise**." He said with some humor. She still looked uncertain, so he gave her one more push. " **What's more important: catching me or saving somebody else?"** She didn't waist another second.

Supergirl took off through the roof of the hanger they were in and went to help her friend. Though she looked absolutely furious she had to let him go.

'It's good to know that when forced to choose between apprehending somebody she hates and saving somebody she loves, she would choose the latter and not the former.' He filed that fact away for later.

Security and medical personnel would arrive two minutes later to secure the Daxamite ship and aid the wounded soldier. And Paladin would once again vanish as soon as they walked into the room.

_o0o_

The next morning, at Kara's apartment, the Girl of Steel sat at her dining table typing on her computer. The voice of her mentor, Cat Grant talking about some politician's policies, was coming from her living room tv. Kara is pulled from her amusement at Cat lecturing reporters about the validity of listening devices being placed inside coffee makers by the sound of her front door opening.

Turning to see her sister Alex walk through the door she turns off the tv before asking about the mercenary she unfortunately failed to apprehend the second time last night.

"What's the update on Bloodsport?"

"You quit?" Alex snapped, completely bypassing Kara's attempt to go right to business.

Kara takes a second to gather herself as she looked up at her sister from where she is sitting. Her sister's unexpected outburst having knocked her on her heels. It didn't take her long to deduce how Alex found out so quickly.

"James has been making the rounds." She deadpanned.

"He's worried about you. I'm extremely worried about you." Alex countered. "Since when do you quit?'

"CatCo. ... isn't the point for me any more." Came the monotone reply.

"You've spent years, working your way up to being a reporter."

"And it was a waist of time." Suddenly Alex was the one who found herself verbally knocked on her heels. The incredulity of that actually made her scoff.

"I would love to see you tell Cat Grant that."

"Cat moved on why can't I?"

Her sister must have been expecting this conversation sooner or later, because she had all her answers prepared in advance. Alex didn't need her government taught interrogation training to see that. The blank expression and unchanging calm tone were pretty clear indicators.

It has been six months since she put these walls up to keep her emotions at bay and Alex had finally had enough. "Okay this is done. I am done walking on eggshells. We all are." Kara ran her hands down her face. As if she was the one who should be exhausted by this conversation. Alex knew then it was a good thing she confronted her sister at her apartment. No where to run to avoid this topic now.

"I have kept my distance. I have given you time to grieve, without prodding. Without making you talk about Mon-El-"

"There's nothing to talk about." Kara said without once turning to face Alex through her entire rant. But the quick way she responded and the tremor of emotion that finally entered her voice proved Alex was starting to crack her emotionless shell.

"Without forcing you to go to game nights. Or come to the bar." Kara finally turned to look at her sister in disbelief.

"There was a burglary."

"THERE'S ALWAYS A BURGLARY." Alex shouted, finally pushed to far by her sisters disregard.

'This ends now.'

"But I have let it slide. Your pity party has gone uninterrupted."

"My _pity party_?"

"Who are you right now?" Alex kept pushing. She would get a real reaction out of Kara if it killed her. " _Kara Danvers_ doesn't quit." Neither does Supergirl, but she hadn't been acting like either for weeks.

"She quits the things that aren't important." She said, rising from her chair to refill her coffee mug.

"CatCo. is important. You help people there."

"Not like Supergirl does."

"Kara Danvers-"

"KARA DANVERS SUCKS RIGHT NOW." Kara roared.

'FINALLY, something real.' Alex thought as her sister looked her in the eye for the first time since she entered the apartment. At last letting out some of what she had been bottling up for months.

"Supergirl is great. Supergirl saved the world. So if I could choose to be her, why would I ever choose to be the sad girl whose boyfriend was taken from her. I don't like that girl Alex."

'Whose boyfriend was _taken_ from her.' Alex knew they had reached the heart of the issue now.

"Kara," Alex began tentatively. "I know you want to hate him, but Paladin didn't take Mon-El from you."

Kara kept her mouth closed and breathed heavily through her nose for a moment before speaking. "You're right. He didn't take Mon-El from me."

'That's too easy.' Alex thought, before Kara continued a second later.

"He just stole the remote to Lena's lead dispersal device right out of my pocket. And set it off when the Daxamite's opened fire during my fight with Rhea." Kara finally admitted.

"I could ha- I would have done it." She confessed. "But he beat me to it. And he didn't even hesitate. The second Rhea's ships opened fire, he pushed the button. I didn't even know he had taken it from me until I heard the device go off and Mon-El started gasping for breath."

Kara's anger seemed to be cooling the more she talked. Alex just stood by quietly as Kara spoke. She didn't try to interrupt, take Kara's hand to comfort her, she barely even moved. Now that her sister had started talking, she was afraid to do anything that might stop Kara from finally letting this out.

"You know, Clark actually said that he was glad that he was the one who did it. That if he had been in that position, he couldn't have made that choice. But I couldn't have lived with myself if I hadn't." Kara admitted. Her tone turning sadder the more she talked. Her emotionless mask broken, her anger released in a quick explosion, and now they were down to her actual grief.

Alex just stood there, looking into her little sister's eyes the whole time. Listening as she at last let her bottled feelings drain out.

"But it doesn't matter. Because he took that choice from me. Just like he has taken the choices of so many others. He's been deciding who gets punished and how, and he needs to be stopped." Kara was back to hiding behind her emotionless mask. Breaking eye contact with Alex, she went back to her computer. "So if you have an update on work I would love to hear it?"

Alex paused for a moment before answering. "Bloodsport has the capability to fire a cloaked nuke at the city." She began to move slowly from around Kara's center island to stand behind where she was seated. "We're thinking that he's going to hit the statue unveiling at the waterfront. J'onn wants everyone there."

"I'll be there."

Kara didn't even turn to look at her as she moved towards the door. Alex stopped before she opened it. "You know Kara Danvers is my favorite person." She began, her throat tight from the feelings she was trying to hold back. "She saved me more times than Supergirl ever could. And I hope that after you catch him, she comes back. Because I don't want to lose my little sister."

No more words are shared as Alex opens the door and departs.

_o0o_

The sun was shining. The wind was bringing in the smell of the ocean. And the sound of all the kids who came out to see the statue dedicated to National Cities greatest hero all combined to make a beautiful day in the city.

He could only hope it would stay that way. Only hope that J'onn was wrong about what Bloodsport had planned for that cloaking device. 'But my instincts say that he's right.' As much as he wished it wasn't so, Bloodsport went through a lot of trouble to sneak on to an army base and steal an alien cloaking device. He had to have some kind of plan for it.

And thats why J'onn and requested that he be here. Invisible of course. He wanted all hands on deck. Even his, though J'onn still wasn't willing to admit he had gone behind his surrogate daughters backs and was working with him.

Lena Luthor was delivering a heartfelt speech as part of the dedication of the new statue. She was just talking about how Supergirl was a friend when the waterfront was suddenly rocked by an explosion.

People began screaming and running for cover from an attack they couldn't see. DEO agents were working frantically to restore order and evacuate the civilians. Then another shockwave hit that almost knocked Paladin off his feet. 'We need to get these people out of here.' That much was obvious. But sense nobody could pinpoint where the attack was coming they were all running in different directions.

It was chaos.

That's when Paladin decided he had been hiding long enough. He lowered the invisibility cloak on his suit. And with his by now familiar burst of silver lightning he began grabbing people and carrying them to a safe distance. Most didn't even realize that they had been saved by a speedster until they stopped running and saw that they were no longer by the water but on the sidewalk between nearby buildings. Those were the lucky ones. The unlucky ones new when they had to stop to vomit on the sidewalk. Traveling by speedster isn't for everybody.

The were making progress. Between Him and the DEO agents, they had gotten the majority of the crowd to a safe distance when another more violent shockwave caused him to stumble and stop. It took him a moment to rise and get his bearings.

"YOU." Looking up, he saw that he had the misfortune of being stopped less than ten feet from Agent Danvers. The look on her face was thunderous. Her hand moved under her coat, most likely to draw her weapon. Whether she was going to try to arrest him or shoot him he would never know. The sound of something passing by overhead caused them all to look up and see Supergirl streak through the sky before diving into the water.

Alex and Maggie ran to the edge nearest to where Kara went under. "She can't breathe underwater."

Alex's declaration had him moving to stand next to them. Not that either of the two women even noticed. They were to busy staring at the water. Waiting for Supergirl to re-emerge. Another shockwave, this time not striking the shore, but detonating a few hundred yards into the ocean was a sign that something may be wrong.

"She's been down there to long." Paladin looked to Alex to see the worried look on her face. She knew that for all her sisters powers she could still drown.

Paladin was surprised when she turned to face him. He wasn't even sure she knew he was here. She paused briefly before asking,"Can you help her?"

He didn't respond verbally. Just turned back to look out to the water before vaulting on top of the railing. He quickly kicked off and sprinted across the water. Rapidly arriving where the last shockwave had originated before he stopped running and took a flying leap diving beneath the water.

The water was freezing he could endure it. It didn't take long to spot Supergirl floating beneath him. Eyes closed, blonde hair fanned out around her, arms and legs limp, she was clearly unconscious. 'Probably knocked out by the last torpedo. Which means she most likely already inhaled some water.' He realized with some panic.

Acting quickly, he swam down to her. Wrapping his right arm around her waist and pulled her closer. Opening the eyes lenses so he could tell if she woke up. He then took a deep breath before he reached up with his other hand and took off his helmet and put it on her. With the runes for the bubblehead charm inside the helmet providing air, the only thing to do was get rid of the water already in her lungs. Placing his hand over the S on her chest, he closed his eyes and pictured the water within her lungs, and vanished it.

But she still wasn't waking up.

'She's been unconscious too long.' He needed to wake her up now. With his hand still hovering over her chest, he cast the waking spell.

'Enervate.'

She didn't wake. Poring more power into his spell he cast it with more force.

'ENERVATE.' Her eyes stayed closed. 'Bloody hell Supergirl don't give up now.' He thought desperately while gathering as much strength as he could for one last attempt. 'People like us aren't lucky enough to go out this peacefully. Not while there are still people who need to be saved. Not while you still have people who love you who still need you. You do not get to die here. NOW. WAKE. UP.'

Not even bothering with the spell he just forced as much magic and intent into her heart as he could.

Her eyes flew open. Grabbing him by the shoulders on reflex, she looked him right in the eyes. A second passed before she shot out of his arms towards the submarine. She was just in time to stop another torpedo from leaving the tube.

He watched as she forced it back into the submarine. Before she flew under it and began to lift it out of the water. Swimming to the surface, he watched as she rose higher and higher. Water cascading off the sub as she held it above her head. His mask still on her head, though he doubted she noticed.

The people on the shore were cheering. Their hero had saved them. No one even noticed when he sped away, his job complete.

_o0o_

Later that night, at every bodies favorite alien bar. They were all thrilled when Kara decided to join them. Winn even looked up from the tablet he was so focused on to give her a hug in greeting.

Drinks were passed around. Kara was celebrating the success of saving hundreds of people, and everybody else was celebrating that _and_ getting Kara to come join them. There was talk about Alex and Maggie's upcoming wedding. Kara thought they made a good choice having pot stickers for hors d'oeuvres. They talked about the wedding shower and how their mom was already going over board with the party games.

Everyone was enjoying themselves.

Eventually the topics turned a little more serious. Like how to connect Morgan Edge to Bloodsport and send them both to jail. Sadly nobody could think of a way. It looked like Edge was going to get away for now. But it would be over an hour before Maggie had the courage to bring up the most interesting subject of the day. "So Kara, what does Paladin look like under the mask?"

Alex had to clamp down on her emotions quickly to stop her shock from showing. She couldn't believe her fiancé could ruin a good night by bringing up the one topic that would piss her sister off. She turned to Kara, almost afraid to see how her face would have closed off.

"Actually I couldn't see his face." Apparently Alex was wrong. Looking at Kara she didn't seem closed off or angry as she looked at each of them in turn. Disappointed maybe, but not at all what Alex was expecting.

"He was above me, and under water. With the light coming down behind him all I could make out was a silhouette." She offered as an explanation. "The most I could see was dark hair and a strong jaw line."

"I wonder what he's going to do without his helmet?" James pondered. Commenting on the black helmet currently being examined by the scientists at the DEO. "Does he have a spare or is he just going to go without one?"

Whether James was trying to change the subject or was honestly curious Alex didn't care. She just jumped on the topic to keep the conversation light. "I suppose it wouldn't matter. He moves to fast for anybody to see his face anyway."

Looking at Kara she could see her set her jaw and straighten her shoulders. Alex was worried. It wasn't the closed off distant Kara that she had been for months, but she was afraid that what her sister said next would be a sign of her going back to it.

"It doesn't matter." She spoke with conviction. "Because mask or no mask we will find him and bring him in."

That wasn't the venomous declaration that she had been expecting and Alex was relieved.

For about ten seconds.

"I'm still not sure about that Kara." J'onn began. "I know you still have problems with him and his methods. But he did save a lot of people at the waterfront today. Yourself included. He may not be a hero but I don't think he is the unfeeling criminal you think he is either."

"He's not a hero—"

"EUREKA." Alex had never been so glad for Winn to interrupt them before. Both Kara and J'onn turned to see what had caused his sudden excitation.

Winn looked up at them like he had just won the lottery. "I did it."

Every one just stared at him waiting for him to continue. It was Maggie who finally gave in to temptation. "Did _what_ Winn?"

Like a stage magician making his big reveal, he just held up his tablet and showed them a map of the city and computer code scrolling across the screen. Nobody understood what he was showing them, but they didn't have to.

"I found where Paladin's been hiding."

_o0o_

Well there you have it, Chapter 3. I hope you guys like it. I'm sorry about how long it took to write. I hope the fact that it is the longest chapter I have ever written for any story can make up for the wait. Now before I go I feel I should clarify some things.

First, if anybody is surprised by the animosity between Kara and Harry let me give you an idea of where I'm going with that. I see them as having some of the same issues with each other that Oliver and Barry had when they first teamed up. Hero meets dark hero and they quarrel over what lines they should and shouldn't cross. They have to learn to work together, eventually.

Second, for those who were hoping to see Harry help with the Daxamite invasion, sorry but I like to leave holes that I can fill in as the story moves forward. I believe filling in the blanks is one of the reasons you guys keep reading ;)

Third, yes I based the design for Harry's suit off of the Black Panther suit. But just the overall design. Its not made of vibranium, it doesn't absorb kinetic energy and there are no cat ears on the helmet. I already have a plan to explain all of its various features and how to introduce them into the story, but you will have to wait until Kara and Alex go to Midvale to find out. I have a completely original story line for that chapter that should answer a lot of questions about Harry's past and how he became Paladin.

Finally, I need your help with something. I know there are multiple references to the Harry Potter series in The Flash and even a few in Arrow but has Winn or anybody in the Supergirl universe made any Harry Potter references. Because I already have a great idea for a character reveal but I need to know if J. K. Rowlings works span the multiverse or if they are limited to earth-1? I can't remember and I don't have the time to bing watch old episodes of Supergirl to look for them. Can you help me out?

On that note I hope you guys liked the chapter and I will try to get the next one out faster. Good morning, good afternoon and good night.


	4. Chapter 4: We've Got You Now

Harry Potter is the property of J. K. Rowlings and Supergirl the CW. I own nothing and I don't make any money from this story.

_o0o_

Chapter 4: We've Got You Now

It didn't take long for them to make it back to the DEO after Winn's announcement. J'onn wanted to wait until morning but Kara wouldn't be denied. Not how Alex expected the night to end, but at least her sister wasn't floating miles above the city listening for gun fire.

Though hunting down a speedster, who bounced back and forth from murderous to heroic, probably wasn't a better alternative.

"What did you find Winn?" Kara asked, her impatience showing. Winn, with a giant grin on his face, moved to sit at his computer terminal. He quickly connected his portable tablet to his terminal before he began to type.

"Have you guys ever heard of the shot spotter system?" Winn began.

"Its the system of microphones that are placed in a connected network around a major city. They're designed to listen for and report gun fire." Maggie explained. Of course as a police detective she was very familiar with this system.

"Exactly. Well I tapped into the shot spotter system for the city to implement my idea." He turned to address Kara specifically. "You asked me to find a way to track Paladin. And I did it." Here Winn paused with his usual big grin on his face. Clearly pleased with himself. But if he was waiting to draw out the suspense, he was just grating on everybody's nerves.

Of course, Kara's patience was the first to run out.

"Aaaannnd?" She dragged out the word trying to prompt Winn without being rude.

"How does the shot spotter system help us find a speedster?" Maggie's impatience was clearly running out now. But Alex couldn't really blame her. Truthfully, one more second and Alex would have asked the question, and not as politely as Maggie did.

"Well Paladin is able to cloak himself from all sorts of visual surveillance and the naked eye but the shot spotter system is able to hear him." Winn explained. "Everybody knows that when you break the sound barrier it causes a sonic boom. But thats just the point at which we can hear it. The truth is that when traveling at, or near, subsonic speeds there are sound waves that can be detected by machines. I was able to recalibrate the system to pick up the sounds that are given off by somebody moving at those speeds."

"Those recalibrations had better not impair the systems ability to report gun fire." J'onn interrupted. Cutting right through Winn's exposition with his usual down to business attitude.

"They won't. In fact I worked out a few bugs in the system while I was working on it." Came the prompt response as Winn waved his hand as if to physically waft the question away from himself. "But thats not the important part. What's important is that it worked."

Here he turned back to face his terminal. After typing for a few seconds he brought up a map of National City on the main monitors. Then red lines started appearing all over the city. When red lines stopped appearing, Winn turned back to face them.

"Tracking those subsonic trails revealed this."

"They cover the entire city." Alex interrupted. Her eyes moving back and forth across the screen. "How does this lead us to his home base?"

"The individual trails themselves only show us where he has been." Winn replied, holding up a finger like a teacher lecturing his students. "But when I looked at all of them I found that several trails converged on multiple locations."

Turning back to continue typing, most of the red lines started to disappear. Until only a few remained. All of which converged on three different points in various parts of the city.

"Where are those locations?" J'onn inquired moving forward to stand right next to Kara. Now in full director mode.

Still facing his computer, Winn pointed at each location and answered. "That is the DEO, that is CatCo Worldwide Media, and Kara's apartment building."

"What!" Kara exclaimed shock and anger clear in her tone. J'onn placed his hand on her shoulder. Whether to offer some form of comfort in the moment or restrain her from doing anything rash, they would probably never know.

"Kara these are the sonic trails you make when you fly through the city."

"Oh," Kara deadpanned. Then with dawning realization, the look on her face fell further. "And I'm guessing there isn't a way to tell my sonic trails from his?"

"Nope. They are entirely indistinguishable from each other." Winn says with a big grin and far more enthusiasm then anybody thought he had any reason too, given that his big idea seemed to be a big waste of time.

Alex decided to call Winn out on it. "Winn you had better not have dragged us all here just to tell us your big idea didn't work."

"Yeah Winn, I thought you said you found his home?" James said.

"Now hold on, o ye of little faith." Winn replied, holding up his hand to forestall any more comments. His cheery attitude never wavering. "There was a fourth point of convergence." One click and the map on the screen zoomed out. Showing the very northern edge of the city. More importantly, a spot on the map miles away from the others where several sonic trails ended.

"And I know for a fact that Kara didn't leave those sonic trails because she hasn't been near that part of the city in weeks." Alex wasn't sure if Winn smile could get any smugger, but it looked like he was trying. However, this time she was inclined to let him enjoy himself. He really had come through for them this time.

"Alex, mobilize the field agents. Maggie, let NCPD know what's going on and ask if they want to help. We're dealing with him tonight." Kara instructed. For some reason Maggie looked unsure. But she never got the chance to say what was on her mind.

"Winn, where is that anyway." James asked.

Winn looked hesitant for the first time since they got to the DEO. "Well, that's where it gets weird."

_o0o_

"This is where Paladin has been hiding?" Maggie asks in bewilderment.

"I'll say this for him, he's original." Alex says. Her tone conveying her own confusion. She had been expecting a stereotypical abandoned warehouse. Or a less stereotypical but still more likely unoccupied home or apartment. In some of her more outrageous expectations, an underground bunker with computer monitors, medical supplies, and his black and silver suit on display. Alex wasn't sure why that particular image popped into her brain, but it still made more sense than this place. "We never would have thought to look for him here."

Alex's posture was noticeably ridged, arms crossed with her feet spread shoulder width apart and her weight perfectly centered. In 'full agent mode' as her fiancé sometimes liked to joke.

Maggie was far more casual. Though her right hand was resting on her gun in its holster, showing she was on guard. Her physical training as an police detective showing.

They were starring up at the stone building as the gaggle of agents behind them got organized creating a perimeter. The sign above the arch on the door identifying it as 'The National City Zoo.' It was the middle of the night, so the entire place was deserted. Which meant they had uninhibited access to the entire facility.

"Kara can you see anything?" Alex spoke into her ear piece. Her sister answered over their comms, as she was currently floating above the zoo. She had been scanning the whole complex since they arrived moments ago. Searching for any sign of their target.

"Nothing," She began. "I scanned the whole place with my x-ray vision. If he has been staying here then he isn't here right now."

"Alright then." J'onn's voice came over their ear pieces.

They were on the south side of the zoo in front of the main entrance. J'onn had taken half of their people to the north entrance to coordinate the perimeter.

"We will sweep the entire complex for any sign of him. If we don't find anything, we can keep the area under discreet surveillance and wait for him to return." J'onn instructed, laying out the game plan. "Alex, you and your team make your way in from the south. My team will make there way in from here and will meet you in the middle. Search the entire zoo. See if you can locate any sign of him."

Even though J'onn couldn't see Alex, she still nodded her head at his instructions. They all made their way inside.

_o0o_

Two hours later and they hadn't found anything. "We've searched almost the entire zoo and we haven't found anything." Maggie said, frustration leaking into her voice. Looking to her fiancé, hoping she would say something to encourage her. Something to make the last few hours seem worthwhile.

She would be disappointed.

"I know. It doesn't make sense." Alex responded. Her own frustration surrounding her like a cloud. "Why would Paladin be here? I mean, who hides in a zoo?" While they had been searching the grounds, Alex kept going over and over it in her mind. Trying to reconcile Paladin's thinking with her tactical training and it just didn't add up.

"Its too open. Exposed. Its too damn public. A speedster in a black and silver suit. Even if he stayed invisible the entire time, somebody would have spotted the energy bolts coming off of him." Alex spoke, voicing her confusing thoughts on the speedster's abnormal choice of hiding place.

"Has anybody figured out how he does that yet?" Maggie practically growled. Clearly her fatigue and frustration was getting the better of her.

"Unfortunately, no. Winn has been too busy trying to find him. But the other scientist at the DEO are studying his helmet as we speak." Alex just sent her a fiancé a despondent look. "They are still trying to figure that one out."

Alex hated that there was nothing she could do. She wanted to say something to make Maggie feel better. That's not true. She wanted to make Maggie feel better, but Alex believed there were more enjoyable ways than talking that she could do that. Sadly, that was going to have to wait until they weren't at work and surrounded by other people.

Before Maggie could respond they are interrupted by agent Ramirez's voice on their comms. "Agent Danvers."

"This is agent Danvers." Alex acknowledged with a touch of her ear piece.

"Ma'am, we found something we think you should see."

"Copy that. What is your location?"

"The House of Jungle Cats ma'am."

"We're on our way." Alex sent her fiancé a look before they both made their way to the aforementioned stone building. The slight upturn of Maggie's lips made Alex feel better. She wasn't smiling yet but things were starting to look up.

Like all places like this, The National City Zoo was divided into various paddocks for different kinds of animals. Of course it had its own themes and charms that made it unique (An albino peacock that wasn't confined to an enclosure, and allowed to roam the foot paths every day was very popular with the kids who wanted to feed it). But certain enclosures were set up right next to each other so that zoo employees could take care of animals with similar needs. So places like the Houses of Jungle Cats, Reptiles, Equines and the Aquarium were dotted throughout the area.

"What did you find?" Alex asked as they entered the circular building. It was set up so that there was a glass wall looking into each of the animal habitats. And standing in front of the lion enclosure were four agents all huddled around something Ramirez was holding.

Alex gave a brief glance to the male lion lounging on a rock near the glass. It seemed to be watching the agents in front of its window. 'Probably thinks we're here to feed it.'

"This is what we found." Agent Ramirez said. He holds up one of their GPS tracking devices.

Alex exchanges a quick perplexed look with Maggie at her side. "What's so special about one of our GPS trackers?"

"Thats isn't one of ours. I mean, well it is one of ours but we didn't bring it ma'am." He briefly swapped glances with the other agents to see them nod their agreement. "Nobody here has any idea where this came from."

Now Alex understood their confusion. 'How can there be a DEO tracker here if one of us didn't bring it.' She takes the tracker from Ramirez. With a sinking suspicion, Alex switches the device on.

"What are you doing?" Ramirez inquired as he watched her.

"I'm going to check the log and see what its been tracking." She answered as Maggie looked over her shoulder.

"What are you thinking Alex?"

She paused before answering her fiancé's question. Unsure if admitting this out loud in front of others was a good idea. "Paladin has managed to stay one step ahead of our search for him. And despite the fact that he and Kara both regularly patrol the city, they have only run into each other once at the army base. Statistically thats hard to believe. Maybe this is how he did it."

"Okay, so what are you thinking? That he stole that from the DEO?" Maggie questioned. "But wouldn't he still need to plant a tracker on somebody at the DEO to track them? How could he possibly know who to apply it to and when."

"Wait a minute." Alex paused in checking the trackers memory, when the screen lit up. "Its tracking something right now."

The other agents, who had been silent since relinquishing the tracker, huddled closer around Alex and Maggie. "Tracking what exactly?" The police detective inquired. She was starting to get the same sinking feeling as her fiancé.

Alex didn't bother answering verbally. She just manipulated the tracker to make it zero in on the signal on the screen. Alex did not like what she found.

She quickly tapped her ear piece. "Kara get down here now."

Something in her sisters voice must have clued her in to the situation because Kara super sped right next to her. "Alex whats wrong?"

Alex's only response was to turn to look right at Kara and start running her hands along her arms and her sides. "Al-Alex, what the...!" So surprised by her sister unexpectedly frisking her, Alex had crouched down and started running her hands along her red boots before Kara thought to stop her.

Taking her by her shoulders she questioned, "What are you doing?"

"Paladins been tracking you." She said, not even pausing in her visual inspection.

"WHAT!" Alex just put her hands on Kara's shoulders and turned her around to start checking her back. Pausing as she moved her cape out of her way.

"What do you mean he has been tracking me? How could he even do that?" Kara asked incredulously.

Alex just stepped around in front of Kara and held up a small metal disc about the size of a dime between her thumb and pointer finger. "This is how."

Kara was stunned. She didn't resist as Alex and Maggie moved her over to the opposite side of the room away from the other agents.

"How is this possible?" Kara asked, her voice hollow. Realizing she had been bugged had knocked her back on her heels.

"You tell me Kara. Have you noticed anything unusual recently?" Alex began to interrogate her. The question may have sounded like something Agent Danvers would ask, but her tone made it clear that this was protective Big Sister Alex Danvers. And she wasn't happy somebody had been keep tabs on her little sister.

"What do you mean unusual?" Kara asked back, her voice hollow with shock.

"Unfamiliar faces showing up a lot? Coming back to your apartment and things not being where you left them? Anything at all?" Alex clarified, trying to push Kara out of her stunned stupor.

"No, no nothing like that."

Alex was growing more and more concerned with the negative answers from her sister. Speedster or not, how could anybody get close enough to Kara to plat something on her without her knowing? The implications were frightening. "There has to be something? Come on Kara think."

"No, Alex. There has been nothing." Kara half shouted.

While the Danvers sisters were busy arguing over how this happened Maggie and the other agents were observing them. Well, Maggie was observing them, she didn't know, or care enough to look behind her and see what the other agents were doing.

Growing up Maggie often wondered what it would be like to have a sister. She always imagined that they would be best friends. It never occurred to her that she would ever fight with her sister. And even though they weren't mad at each other, it was clear on their faces how upsetting this impromptu interrogation was making both of them. Looking at the Danvers girls now, all she could think was, 'maybe I dodged a bullet.'

So she just watched the back and forth between the two like a tennis match. Until her eyes happened to stop on something in the paddock they had moved in front of. It was hard to spot the animal laying on the lowest branches of a small tree near the glass wall. But its eyes were visible. The green glow of its irises could be seen between the branches.

Maggie was just about to look back to the sisters when something strange happened. They green eyes staring at her suddenly became ringed in electricity.

Maggie didn't feel it as her draw dropped. 'Did that just happen?'

Before she could interrupt the sisters and ask if they would take a look, the animal dropped from the branches. The sisters stopped arguing. Their attention grabbed by the sleek black panther now staring at all of them. That lasted for all of a second before the panther was surrounded by silver lightning bolts before it seemed to blur at the edges. It charged at the glass and leapt right through it.

For a moment, everything seemed to be moving in slow motion. The panther almost seemed suspended in mid air Alex flung her arm out against Maggie's chest and forced her back. She could see Kara over the creatures back. Arms stretched out as she instinctively leaned back out of its way, eyes wide and mouth agape.

The creature, for it was clear at this point that it was not a panther, landed in the middle of the room. Its pitch black fur melted into a black and silver suit, its paws turned into hands and feet, its ears and tail retracted into its body. And in an instant, the panther was gone, and a familiar man was crouched in front of them. He shot a brief glance at them over his shoulder.

Whoosh, and he was gone.

Maggie turned to Alex. Placing her hand on her forearm to drag her attention from where the speedster just exited and pointing after him, "That just happened right? You saw that?"

"HE'S MINE." Kara roared before tearing after him.

She was out the door and hovering over the zoo in a nanosecond. Eye sweeping the area for miles in every direction.

"Kara, he's heading south." Winn instructed over her comm link.

Quickly zeroing in on the silver lightning trails heading back to the heart of National City. Fists clenched and thrusting her arms out in front of her, she tore after him.

She ignored the voices of Alex and the other DEO agents talking in her ear. None of them were speaking to her. But by the sounds of things, they were moving to pursue her and Paladin. But she knew they were never going to catch him.

It's up to her.

It didn't take long to catch up to him. Which seriously confused Kara. She knew he could move much faster than this. 'So why am I gaining on him so quickly?'

The gap between them was closing rapidly. Kara was actually starting to wonder if he realized she was chasing him. That was the moment Paladin chose to look over his shoulder. He looked right at her, and smirked. The bastard just _smirked_ at her. Now Kara realized what was happening. 'He's toying with me. That arrogant piece of... He let me catch up.'

In anger, Kara put on an extra burst of speed to close the last remaining yards between them. She reached out with her hand, 'you are not getting awa-.'

He swiftly darted down another street. Kara rapidly changed direction to pursue him. He only traveled a hundred yards before he changed direction again.

Then he changed direction again.

And again.

He was zooming through the city, almost faster than Kara could follow. Kara could tell that he had to be moving at top speed now, because even though the gap between them wasn't closing, it wasn't getting any wider either.

Kara was sure the only reason he wasn't pulling away was because she could fly. She had a wider range on maneuverability and versatility. He was confined to the ground. Moving around buildings and juking between cars and people.

'He's not getting away.'

Apparently, Paladin realized the same thing. That's when he changed tactics. He made another sharp turn. Though this time he wasn't turning down another street. He was heading strait for the side of a building. Then he was heading strait up the side of the building. Silver lightning trailing his every step.

Kara turned strait up and ascended like a rocket trying to break orbit. Leaving her own red and blue streak in her wake.

Kara was confused though. 'What's he thinking?' He might have found a path of least resistance, but it was also a path that was quickly coming to an end. He only had another five floors and then he would have to turn around and head back to ground.

Right at her.

'He cornered himself. There's no way for-.' Kara came to a screeching halt in mid air. Her thoughts as frozen as her body as she watched him push off from the top most ledge and make a flying leap off of the building. For a moment an arc of silver lightning connected the top of the first building to the side of the taller one.

He was on his way back to ground before Kara shook off her surprise. She shot after him. Descending like a comet in an effort to close the head start gap her temporary shock had given him. She hadn't expected him to do that. She had seen her friend Barry run up the side of buildings (that was how they first met actually). But she had never seen a speedster leap from one building to another. Either Barry hadn't had the opportunity to show that particular skill while chasing Livewire, or he hadn't been crazy enough to try it.

Either way, it didn't matter at this point.

Now the game had changed. Paladin would move up one building leap to the next and move down another. Kara was pushing her aerial agility to the limits trying to keep up as he traveled though National City like a skater on a half pipe.

But she refused to let him get away.

And then he made a mistake. He ran up one skyscraper that was several stories taller than any of the other nearby buildings. When he made it to the top he would have to free fall far enough and long enough for her to reach him. But as she followed him higher and higher part of her was worried.

'Every time I've thought he had made a mistake he proved he had a plan.' Kara realized. 'What is he thinking this time?'

Kara was surprised when he seemed to be slowing down. Not to look a gift horse in the mouth, she made a desperate grab to catch him before he could enact whatever plan he had. She was stupefied when mere inches from making contact with him he dropped beneath her line of sight, and disappeared. Before she barreled right past where she saw him.

For at least the third time in the last hour Kara was so startled she slammed on her breaks. This time she did it so quickly that her cape flew up over her head. Swiftly throwing it back she looked down, searching for his lightning trails.

Not seeing any flash of silver, Kara tapped her comm. "Winn, I lost sight of him. Are you tracking him?"

"No. He isn't making any sonic trails. I've lost him too."

"How is that possible?" Alex asked Winn over the comm channel. "As long as he is running you should be able to track him, right?" Clearly she had made it back to the DEO while Kara had been chasing Paladin through the city.

"Yeah, thats true." Winn rushed to explain as Kara floated back down to where she last saw him. "He must have stopped running. Thats the only explanation for why we can't find him." His explanation sounded a little hurried, verging on panicked. He must have been able to hear the anger in Kara's voice. And he had an up close and personal view of, what Kara called, Alex's 'angry face.' Being on the receiving end of the tempers of both the Danvers sisters wasn't something any one wanted.

"How the hell is that possible? At the speed he was moving that would be like slamming into a brick wall. How could he have possibly stopped on a dime like that?"

Kara looked at the building and noticed something interesting. "I know how he managed to stop so fast."

"How?"

"Before I lost sight of him it looked like he was reaching for the concrete wall. Right at the buildings ledge. And now there are ten claw marks gouged into the concrete." Kara described to what was no doubt a very captive audience at the DEO. "I think he used his claws like emergency brakes."

"The inertial force of a move like that..." Winn trailed off. "Kara, look at the claw marks. Do you see anything? Any pieces of the talons?"

She scrutinized the stone. "No, nothing." Kara answered in confusion.

"Even at those speeds there is no way the stress wouldn't break those claws. If they are composed of any alloy or metal known to man. I have got to get my hands o-..." Winn trailed off. Kara could just picture Alex standing over Winn and glaring him into silence.

She was likely getting tired of him geeking out over the claws and getting distracted from the main objective.

"Winn, how do we find him now?" Kara urged, forcing them both back to the problem in front of them. "J'onn, any ideas?"

The leader of the DEO had been unusually silent (for him anyway) up to this point. Kara hoped it was because he was busy coming up with a plan. Kara wasn't going to be disappointed.

"If he isn't making any sonic trails then he isn't running away. Which means he still has to be close by." J'onn interjected. "Supergirl, you can still find him the way we found him before."

"What are you talking about J'onn?" Kara asked her surrogate father. Unclear on his meaning.

"Listen for him. Kara he can hide himself from your eyes, but not from your super hearing. Listen for him." J'onn urged.

Kara closed her eyes and unleashed the full power of super hearing. The sounds of the city were open to her. The cars on the streets. The airplanes and helicopters overhead. These things were unimportant. She began to narrow her focus. The people in the building she hovered outside of. She could hear a man and woman eating dinner and watching the evening news. A boy play video games on his computer. She could hear one young girl listen to music and dancing in her room. Talking about getting ready for a recital at school.

And then she heard it. The sound of a fast heart beat. So rapid it couldn't be from a normal human. But for a speedster, it was almost calm. It was only a few short meters to the right of where she had last seen him.

Drifting closer, her eyes still shut to better hear if he moved. But he didn't he was almost unnaturally still. Like an animal that knew it was being stalked and was waiting for the right moment to run. Or to fight back.

Opening her eyes she looked right at where she new he was standing. A second passed before he began to shimmer back into visibility before her. For the first time she got a look at the man beneath the mask.

He had raven black hair down to his chin. It was scraggly and looked like it hadn't been washed in days. She could barely make out the green of his eyes underneath his bangs. But she could tell they were slitted like the cat he had been pretending to be. And there was a scar on the left side of his jaw that extended into his collar.

They glared at each other for a moment, before Kara lunged forward and grabbed him by his shoulder. He lashed out with his claws and cut into the symbol on her chest. It tore her suit, but did nothing but spark against her skin.

In her anger, Kara forced him against the wall at his back hard enough to form cracks in the bricks.

Kara growled, her face less than a foot from his. Her usually beautiful face twisted in rage. "Your not getting away."

"ENOUGH." He roared.

He thrust his hand forward, not lashing out with his claws this time, but striking her chest with his palm. There was a flash of red light. It overwhelmed her senses, blinding her. And a horrible high pitched screeching in her ears that had her clamping her hands over them in an effort to block it out. But that didn't help. The screeching didn't stop until she took her comm out of her ear. It was sparking in her hand.

With the ringing stopped and her eyes coming back into focus, she noticed she was still floating outside the building. She had been forced back several feet. She didn't have time to wonder what he had hit her with. She was to distracted by the fact that Paladin had once again disappeared.

She spun around, sweeping her eyes over the city, but couldn't catch a single glimpse of silver lightning. Her super hearing revealed no nearby heartbeats. Her eyes glowed, her rage igniting but not unleashing her heat vision.

Paladin had escaped again.

_o0o_

The sun was just rising as J'onn watched, with no small amount of trepidation, as Kara landed on the balcony of the DEO. Judging by the look on her face and the way she was stomping across the room, it was obvious she was angry. J'onn knew that her mood was going to get a lot worse very soon.

"I scoured the entire city. I couldn't see or hear him." She exclaimed.

"Kara." J'onn tried to interrupt.

"Was Winn able to track him after I lost him?"

"Kara." J'onn tried again with a little more force.

"And I'm going to need a new communicator. My last one-" She continued.

"Kara!" J'onn nearly shouted, finally breaking her tunnel vision. "Kara, he's here."

The silence that followed was deafening.

Kara's mouth opened and closed several times, as if she was trying to speak but the words just wouldn't come out. Finally, she gathered herself, and spoke.

"What do you mean 'he's here?" She asked, barely above a whisper.

J'onn just turned to the main screens of the DEO control room. The main monitor showed the holding cell. Inside the cell, stood Paladin. He had been stripped of his weapons. His claws and suit were gone. All he had on was a pair of boxer shorts.

"How?"

"He showed up about an hour ago." He explained. "Just zipped right into this room. Took off his gauntlets and suit, and just laid them on the ground. Alex escorted him to the cell, and he went with out any resistance. He surrendered to us."

"Where is Alex?" She asked starring at the monitor. Trying to wrap her head around what she had been told.

"Alex and Winn are in the lab right now. They are examining his suit and claws as we speak."

"Good." Was the stoic response he received. Normally Kara was an open book. J'onn didn't need the ability to read minds to know what she was thinking. But right now a statue showed more emotion than Kara was.

"I'm going to speak to him." That declaration surprised him.

"Kara, I don't think thats a good idea." J'onn tried to say. But she was already walking out of the room.

It took her less than a minute before she made her way from the main chamber and stood in front of the transparent door of his cell. He stood there just as he appear on the monitor, right in front of the door. Back strait, arms crossed, feet shoulder width apart. He watched her as she entered. She came to stand before the door to his cell in the same position as him.

They stared at each other. Separated only by the door to the cell. Kara finally got a good look at him. He was built like she expected. Thin but with strong muscles. And he had scars. Kara wasn't sure how it was possible to leave lasting scars on a speedster. His ability to heal should be on par with her own. Yet she could see a strait one on his right forearm. An old burn mark on his left shoulder. Another on his left thigh that looked like a stab wound. And most prominent of all was the scar she saw before on his jaw, which didn't just extend to his collar bone, but all the way down to his right hip. Its edges were smooth for a scar. As if it was done quickly and with a single strike.

Finished with her examination, Kara finally broke the silence between them.

"You're not going to escape this time. You're going to answer for every crime you've committed. Every person you've hurt. You're going to face justice." She almost spat at him. "We've got you now."

He regarded her in silence, contemplating her declaration, before he blinked and started laughing at her.

_o0o_

There it is. Sorry chapter four took so long. My last computer met with an unfortunate accident and I had to wait till I could buy a new one before I could finish. Again, my apologies.

Now I have some questions to ask you. First what did you think of his hiding place and animagus form? I tried so hard to be original. But before any of you ask I know some of you made the connection between Harry's suit and Black Panther. But I want to say that I had planned to make his animagus a panther before the movie ever hit theaters. I wanted to make him a black cat because of Kara's first pet Streeky. I planned to use Harry's similarity to her cat in some interesting ways in later chapters.

Also, how is my writing? I don't mean my story in general. I want to know if you guys think I am writing the characters well. Are they similar to the real characters? Are they acting the way they would act, saying things you would expect them to say? Am I portraying them as well as Melissa Benoist, Katie McGrath and all the rest of them?

Next it has been pointed out to me that my spelling and grammar has some small errors. For this reason I am asking if any of you are interested in being a beta. If so send me a message and we can talk.

Finally, I want to let you guys know what to expect for next chapter. You will finally get some answers about Harry as each person on team Supergirl gets a chance to ask him questions. And I'm really looking forward to continuing the conversation between Kara and Harry. I don't think its going to go the way you thinks its going to happen. I know its not going to be what Kara expects.

Having said that, I hope you guys liked the chapter and I hope you leave me a review. Good morning, good afternoon and good night.


	5. Chapter 5: Are We Allies?

Harry Potter is the property of J. K. Rowlings and Supergirl the CW. I own nothing and I don't make any money from this story.

_o0o_

Chapter 5: Are We Allies?

"Alex Danvers was worried.

You'd never know it by looking at her as she sat at her computer in her lab. Because even in this rare private moment, in the solitude of her personal work space, her face was still kept carefully neutral. Not out of etiquette, necessity or even ingrained habit. It was because she was afraid if she lifted the lid on the box containing her emotions then she may start smashing things like her sister had done.

She took a sip of her, by now, lukewarm coffee before turning her eyes back to the screen. She had been watching the same security footage over and over. Ever since her sister had flown off in the worst mood Alex had ever seen.

"J'onn had called her, Winn, and James to the main control room as soon as Kara had marched out of the room. They all watched the entire conversation while Winn recorded it. Needless to say, the conversation didn't go as expected.

"She pressed the button to rewind it back to the beginning again. Truthfully she had probably already gleamed everything she was go to from the short conversation. But that didn't mean she wasn't going to try and find something to help her feel more prepared for when she herself finally stood on the other side of that transparent wall.

'Kara didn't exactly go in there with the intent to interrogate him. She made the same mistake when we held Maxwell Lord. Just marched into his cell to taunt him. I love her, but Kara is not a real agent.' She thought with some contempt. 'That's what I'm here for.'

"But Paladin didn't have to threaten their mother to piss her off the way Max did. 'No, he took a different approach.' She thinks as she presses play again.

"He was just standing in front of the door to his cell, barely even twitching. 'For a guy who could break the sound barrier in a pair of sneakers he can be frighteningly still.' Was Alex's first thought every time she watched this. His arms were crossed in front of him. 'A defensive posture. He's expecting a confrontation.' Kara marched into view right up to the door of his cell. Her stance mirrored his.

"They glared at each other for a moment. Alex could see her sisters eyes moving over his body. Taking in his form and the multitude of scars that littered it. 'They certainly caught my attention.' She thought with some sarcasm. 'From a medical view point: major trauma. But some of the scars are older than others. Obviously sustained over a long period of time. What could do that to a speedster?'

"You're not going to escape this time. You're going to answer for every crime you've committed. Every person you've hurt." Kara declared with firm conviction. "You're going to face justice. We've got you now."

'You could have been a little more subtle with your intentions Kara.' Alex brought her mug to her lips and took another sip of coffee. Paladin just blinked for a moment before he busted out laughing at Kara.

Setting her mug back down, Alex let out a deep sigh. 'If he wanted to piss her off there wasn't much more he could have done then laugh in her face.'

"Seriously? You're laughing?" Kara exclaimed, her incredulity clear in every syllable. "If you think you can escape then you are dumber than you look. This cell is designed to hold meta-humans, even a speedster. You aren't going anywhere."

"Bloody hell, you have a one track mind you know that." That, right there, was the first real thing that they had managed to learn about Paladin. That accent and his use of the words bloody hell.

'Paladin is British.' That went in the first line of Alex's mental checklist.

"And you misunderstand my amusement. I'm not laughing because I know I can escape," Item number 2: He is either very arrogant, or he already has a method of escape. "Its because you actually believe you caught me."

"Kara drew back like she had been slapped. "Hello. In case you haven't noticed, your in a cell." Kara said with obvious contempt as she put her hands on her hips in typical Kara fashion when she wanted to look more impressive.

"He just smirked and looked off to the side. Like he thought looking her in the eye would reveal the punch line to the joke. "Let's take a moment and examine that, shall we." His tone was that of a teacher lecturing a difficult child.

"Firstly, you didn't catch me. You weren't even in the building. Oh I can understand your need to entertain some fantasy about charging out of the DEO to apprehend the vicious speedster who had been terrorizing your city. But we both know the truth. You didn't catch me, I surrendered."

'Number 3: he has a theatrical side. I might be able to use that to trick him into revealing something.

"I meant the DEO caught you." Kara snapped.

"Secondly," He continued like her sister hadn't interrupted. "The DEO is a government organization that monitors alien activity. And despite a few subtle differences I am very much human. Jurisdictionally, your sister doesn't even have the authority to put me in here."

"You're A meta-human." Now Kara was smiling. "And the DEO does have jurisdiction to hold you." She said smugly, now that she had found something to counter him with.

"And thirdly," He continued without missing a beat, "I haven't committed any crime." Now he was the one who looked smug. "Unless impersonating a zoo animal is a crime on this earth." The smug looked suddenly dropped from his face. "Its not, is it?"

Kara looked like she was torn between laughing in incredulity, and punching him in outrage. "Your kidding right."

"Apparently she had settled on outraged.

"Not a week ago you paralyzed a man from the waist down."

This time it was his turn to interrupt. "A gun wielding criminal who was threatening the store clerk and a father trying to protect his daughter."

"And I don't even want to count how many people you have injured or maimed in the months since you arrived."

"All criminals who were a clear danger to the lives of those around them." He countered, almost exasperated.

Kara just looked stricken by his answer. "How can you do that? How can you be blasé about what you've done? I just don't get how you can be so cavalier about other peoples lives!"

"Well we can't have that Supergirl. I want no more secrets between us, so anything you don't understand I'll explain to you."

"Thanks, but that won't be necessary." Kara snarled through grit teeth. "I don't need, or want to understand you." Here Kara turned and march for the door. But she didn't get more than three steps before she was stopped by his voice.

"Supergirl, I'm disappointed in you." He chided. Kara half turned to look at him. "I thought you were all about justice and bringing hope to the masses. Yet you are willing to let such dangerous individuals threaten the lives of innocent people?"

"I am out there every day protecting the people of this city. I've helped to lock up hundreds of criminals. This city-... this planet is a better place because of me. And I have never had to resort to killing or permanently injuring the people I've apprehended."

"People like Maxwell Lord, who you never managed to connect to having his own train highjacked? People like Leslie Willis, who escaped containment multiple times? People like Morgan Edge, who you still can't prove tried to blow up hundreds of people at the waterfront a few days ago?" He rattled off far to quickly for Alex's comfort. "Or what about every prisoner from Fort Rozz who escaped and killed who knows how many people before you even knew that they were out there. All because your people didn't have the stomach to do what had to be done."

And there was number 4. 'He has a frightening amount of information that is supposed to be classified by the DEO.'

"Look I admit that the legal system isn't perfect-"

"How convenient for you."

"-but if we cross the line from protecting the innocent to punishing the guilty, then we are no better than the ones we are trying to fight."

"You mean like the Hellgrammite I apprehended for you? The rapist I killed last month? The mugger in the convenient store I paralyzed? Or any one of the multitude of other criminals and aliens I've stopped in the months I've been here." His voice was getting louder, and his tone was different. Alex wasn't sure how to describe it. But it made her think of an actor on a stage.

"So you admit your crimes?" Kara's voice was rising now. Either she was angry at his blatant disregard for the things he had done, or she was just trying to match the strength in his voice with her own. But the look on her sisters face made her heart ache.

"I ADMIT EVERYTHING." He spread his arms out wide as if to welcome any rage Kara might unleash on him. "Why not? My accomplishments speak for themselves. None of the monsters I captured will ever escape or harm another innocent ever again. Can you say the same?"

Kara seemed stunned into silence. Her lips kept twitching like she wanted to say something. Clearly she wanted to refute his claims. She wanted to prove that such violent tactics weren't just unnecessary but were reprehensible. Or maybe she just wanted to tell him to go to hell. Alex wasn't sure which. Either way, Kara never got the chance to decide what she was going to say before Paladin demonstrated the final point on her list, and dropped one last bomb that shocked all of them.

"And as for your ability to keep me in this cell..." He reached forward and placed his hand on the door near the lock, and slid it open. Alex wasn't ashamed to admit that the first time she saw that while standing in the DEO control room she almost jumped right out of her skin. The shock was plain on every face in the room. She and James were just about to charge right in there to help her sister with whatever fight was about to happen.

Turns out, it wasn't necessary.

Kara had tensed, ready for a fight, the moment he opened that door. But he never set one foot out of that cell. He raised his hands to shoulder height, and placed them on either side of the door frame to the cell. Then he just leaned forward until his nose would have been touching the glass if the door had still been closed, and spoke, "You didn't put me in here. You can't keep me in here. And most importantly, you don't have the authority to do so even if you could."

Then the smug jerk pushed off from the door turned and sat on the cot on the far side of the cell. Leaned back against the wall with his legs crossed in front of him, he looked as comfortable and relaxed as if he were lounging in his favorite chair at home.

He even left the door open.

The message was clear. 'I can leave whenever I want. And there is nothing you can do about it.'

Kara marched to the key panel and hit the button to close and lock the door. Then she stomped out of the room with Paladin watching her every step.

When she stomped into the control room with everybody else she was practically trembling with restrained anger. There had been other criminals who had managed to use loopholes in the law to get the better of the DEO, and Kara specifically. Lord, Roulette, Edge, just to name the most memorable.

They had all managed to push Kara's buttons in one way or another. But Alex had never seen anybody get under her sister's skin the way Paladin just did. The combination of the loss of Mon-El, the anger over his methods, and the indignation of his indifference was all just to far over the line.

Kara ignored every 'are you okay,' and 'don't listen to that jerk,' as she walked to the circular table in the control room. Everybody quickly fell quiet as she leaned her elbows on the table and her forehead against her interlaced fingers. She was clearly trying to compose herself and they were all going to let her.

What felt like hours to Alex, but could only have been seconds, passed before Kara broke the silence. She didn't bother looking up, but she asked the worst possible question she could have asked.

"Is he right?" The silence should have been answer enough, but Kara seemed to be glutton for punishment today. "Is he right? Do we have the authority to hold him, or not?"

All eyes around the table turned to look at J'onn and Maggie standing on the opposite side of the table from where Kara was hunched over.

Maggie had looked contrite, like she would have given anything not to have to answer. Fortunately for her J'onn saved her the trouble. "The DEO is an institution of the federal government of the United States of America. By law we can hold a suspect for up to forty-eight hours without cause. However, at that point we must charge him with something or we have to release him."

"Then we're good," James interjected. "Like Kara said he's hurt people, he's killed people. I know Winn recorded all the footage we had on him. We can charge him for every single crime."

"Its not that simple." Came Maggie's melancholy reply. Gaze sweeping around the table, Maggie looked like she was about to face a firing squad. She knew what she was about to say would not go over well. "I've seen all the footage that Winn has. And I know you don't want to hear this Kara," her gaze settled on Kara (whose knuckles had gotten whiter the more Maggie spoke) "but the truth is that he is right. Every action he took was in defense of somebody's life. I mean maybe we can make a case for excessive force, but..." She paused again. She knew she was about to slam the lid on the whole thing. "But I don't think there is a single prosecutor in National City who would bother to bring charges against him."

CRASH

Everybody took a quick step back from the table. Alex and Maggie's hands went to their holsters out of reflex. James had his arms raised like he was afraid to touch anything. Winn had quick as a flash, scooped up his tablet and was cradling it protectively to his chest. The only person who hadn't moved was J'onn.

In her frustration, Kara had slammed her clenched fists down on the table so hard that part of it collapsed. The light in the table had gone out and a few exposed wires were sparking.

But she didn't see any of this.

Alex doubted she even realized the damage she did. One second her hands hit the table and the next second her back was turned and she was fast marching towards the balcony. No one tried to stop her from flying off.

That was more than an hour ago.

J'onn had immediately called for somebody to fix the table before he asked Alex to be the next to speak with him.

'And I've been watching the same video footage over and over ever since.' Alex thought with some self recrimination. 'This isn't what I do. I don't hide from suspects. Why the hell am I still in here?'

Truth was she knew why she was in here. She was trying to calm down. Trying to separate herself from her feelings before she went in there to face him. She needs a clear head and control of her emotions. She had to go in there as an agent. Not the big sister who was about to give a bloody nose to the bully who had pushed her little sister on the play ground.

If she went in there with the wrong mentality, he would get under her skin the same way he had Kara's. 'But its time to stop hiding. Ready or not Paladin, here I come.'

Alex threw back the last of her, now cold, coffee and proceeded out of her lab and down to the holding cell. On her way through the control room she noticed the round table was being repaired. Winn was at the main console with his back to her.

J'onn was standing behind him. Facing the monitors when she walked in, but turned to look at her as she made her way to the holding cells. This strange pensive look crossed his face before he set his jaw and nodded at her and turned and spoke to Winn. Putting that strange look out of her mind, she proceeded down the hall, through the doors to the holding room, and up to the clear door of his cell.

What surprised her was that when she got there she looked in the cell and saw, not a man, but a big black panther lying on the cot in the cell.

In the time since Kara had stomped out of here, Paladin had apparently decided to get some sleep. 'Though why he would choose to sleep as a cat when he doesn't have too is just another thing in a long list of things that don't add up about him.'

For a moment she just watches him...it...whatever. If she didn't know it was a disguise she would think he was a real panther. From the twitch of his whiskers to the way the tip of his tail was swaying back and forth as it hung off of the cot.

'Kinda reminds me Streaky, and how he used to lounge right in the middle of the couch and nobody else could sit on it till he moved.'

But after watching him for a moment, her interrogation training kicked in, and Alex realized this was an opportunity.

'Step one for an interrogation. Get the subject off balance. Best move for that is shock and awe.' With that thought, Alex raised her fist and pounded several times on the glass.

Paladin jolted awake with a startled 'yowl' and a showing of, in Alex's opinion, impressive white fangs.

"Get up. We need to talk." Alex began without preamble.

In a very cat like move, he extended his front legs out arched his back and flexed his talons in a typical move for a waking cat. Then he stepped down from the cot and transformed back into his human form.

Again Alex noted the various scars on his body and that his eyes were still slit like a cats, before she decide to get started. "Why did you surrender?" Alex already knew the answer to that question. J'onn had pointed it out before Kara flew off an hour ago. But its a basic technique for getting information. First you ask questions you already know the answer to, or you don't think the subject would bother to lie about to create a base line. Then ask questions you think they would lie about and look for what they do differently. Simple human lie detector test.

After sitting through her classes on this Alex would have sworn her mother attended the same lectures. 'That has to be why Kara and I could never get away with anything.'

"Because I want the DEO to stop chasing me." Was his succinct reply.

"Why sleep as a cat?" This wasn't important, obviously. Alex was asking out of sheer curiosity.

He took a second to think before he just shrugged his shoulders. "Several reasons actually. Built in fur blanket, don't have that pain in your lower back and... your thoughts are simpler. Animal minds are less complex, more feelings and instincts than thoughts. Makes it easier to sleep." Hearing that Alex feels a brief pang of envy that she can't sleep as a cat.

Or any animal really.

"What's your name?"

"Paladin."

"No your real name?" Alex replied.

"Paladin is my real name." There. The way his right hand moved. He was running his thumb along one of his fingers. 'That's his tell.'

"Or at least the only one that really means anything to me."

Letting that last comment slide Alex got on to the real questions. "Where did you come from?"

He tilts his head to the side as if pondering his response. "Are you familiar with the theory of the multiverse?"

"Yes actually. You're not the first speedster to visit our earth from another one." Her answer seemed to surprise him for a moment. But he took it in stride.

"I come from a place you would call earth 47."

'Thats strange. His fingers twitched but he isn't running his thumb along them again. Does that mean he's not lying but he's concerned about the question. Like he doesn't want me to dig deeper. Or is this a lie he has told so many times it barely registers anymore?' Deciding this is something she can circle back to later, Alex moves to something more pressing.

"Why are you on our earth?"

"I don't know." His hand never moved. That stopped her in her tracks. Either Alex was totally wrong about his tell or he wasn't lying. But that would mean he has no idea why he is here.

"How the hell can you not know why you are on some other earth?" Her disbelief was plain in every syllable.

"Because they don't tell me why they send me places." He whispered, probably more to himself than to Alex. But whether he meant to or not he just raised a red flag for Alex.

"They. Who's they? And why are they sending you anywhere." Alex pushed to know, because that was just a vagueness that hinted more than it told.

"Inconsequential." He pushed back.

A short and clearly agitated reply. He's shutting down, and getting emotional. 'Good, lets get on to the most important questions.'

"Why did you steal the remote to the lead dispersal device?" She demanded.

"Two reasons. Firstly, when I saw Ms. Luthor give Kara the control to the device, I didn't believe she had the heart to use it. Not when it would cost her the man she loved." Pushing right past that insult to her sisters character, she demanded more. "And the second?"

"I didn't think she should have too. Nobody should have to endure that." He said with some melancholy in his tone. Sounded like he knew from experience.

Now Alex felt like the one off balance. "What are you talking about?"

"Think about it. All that anger at me. All that drive into apprehending me. All that loathing of my methods. What do you think that emotion would do...if it was turned inward?" Alex felt a cold chill run down her spine as she imagined what shape Kara might be in if, as he said, she hated herself as much as she seemed to hate him. And she felt a brief, and unexpected, swelling of gratitude for him. But attempting to move past that (for her own sake) she started pushing the interrogation harder.

"So I'm supposed to believe that what you did was an act of compassion."

"Yes." His voice was low and filled with a terrifying sort of rage. He was getting angry now. He didn't like his integrity questioned.

"How do you know so much about classified DEO operations?"

"Thats irrelevant." He growled. His teeth seem to be getting sharper and his nails were turning into claws.

"Its not irrelevant. Not. To. Me." She said with force.

"Well, forgive me, but I don't really care what you find relevant."

"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?"

"HARRY POTTER." He roared.

A cold bucket of water was just thrown over Alex's temper. He broke their staring contest and started rubbing his forehead. Alex took a minute to try and process what she was just told and promptly starts to giggle.

Soon her giggles were full on laughter. He just turned to look at her. "And what exactly is so funny?"

"I'm sorry," Alex tried to say threw her fading laughter. "I just thinks it's hilarious that there are Harry Potter fans on other earths."

His face twisted in horror. "Oh no. You mean to tell me there is a J. K. Rowlings on this earth too?"

She just raised her eyebrows at him. "I'm sorry. Am I supposed to believe you are the real Harry Potter?" Alex said with humor and no small amount of incredulity.

In response, he twirled his arm over his head. Enunciated "Expecto Patronum," and swung his arm forward like a pitcher throwing a curve ball. A ball of bright light flew from his hand and expanded to form a translucent panther.

It watched her for a beat, before it roared at her and vanished into mist.

Alex didn't realize her jaw had dropped until it forms a little 'o.' "Wow."

_o0o_

"Harry Potter. Harry Potter? Harry...Potter!" Since the identity of who they were holding had been revealed, Winn had spent the last ten minutes pacing around his lab. Apparently trying to wrap his head around the concept that his favorite fictional character was apparently not so fictional.

"I know. Its unbelievable." Replied James from where he was sitting with his hands on his head. Just as stunned as his best friend. James had walked into the DEO mere moments after J'onn asked Winn to bring up the security footage on the holding cell. They saw the entire exchange between him and Alex.

She walked out of the holding area right after the big reveal. When she walked into the control room she did it with a glazed look on her face. In her defense, Winn doubted she went in there expecting to witness and actual patronus. James had agree that anybody would have good reason to be stunned by that.

It took a few tries for J'onn to get her attention. When he couldn't get more than a few one word responses out of her, J'onn decided to take her home for the night. Apparently, she was having just as much trouble wrapping her head around this as Winn and James were.

"So many things about this guy suddenly makes sense." Winn continued. "Like his ability to hide in plain sight thats got to be his invisibility cloak. And the helmet, we couldn't figure out how Kara could use it to breathe under water. Its got to be some variant of the bubble head charm. And the turning into a panther thing. He's an animagus. I mean I would have expected a stag, but a big cat is still cool. OH MY GOD." Winn rambled so fast James could barely keep up with what he was saying.

"They got it wrong. The books got it wrong. If they could get his patronus wrong then what else could be wrong. This is terrible." Winn was rapidly approaching the thin line between stunned amazement and crazed amazement. And if James didn't do something fast he was going to bodily throw himself over it.

"Hey look on the bright side," James began grasping at straws, and hoping Winn didn't pick up on it. "We have the chance to ask him ourselves exactly what the books got right and what they didn't."

Winn stopped dead in his tracks. He seemed to be contemplating James point. Finally, with a smile from Winn, and a relieved sigh from James, he seemed to calm down.

"You're right. We can ask him anything. All the questions Rowlings left unanswered. We have the chance to actually ask some one who was there. This is going to be so cool." He finished with a huge grin on his face. Winn made a few quick steps towards the door before he was stopped by James.

"Yeah but maybe we should wait until after we aren't holding him prisoner to have a friendly conversation about his life story."

Winn just stared at James for a moment before tilting his head back and forth into thought. "Yeah that might be a good idea."

_o0o_

It had been hours sense Alex had left. Sun light could be seen through the windows again. That meant he had officially been in this cell for more than twenty-four hours. One more day and they would have to let him go and wouldn't be able to pursue him anymore.

Earlier he thought he heard some kind of commotion. But obviously he wasn't going to go investigate. Not when he was so close to getting the DEO off his back.

Nobody else had tried to come and interrogate him. He was just beginning to think that he was going to be left alone for his final day when J'onn came charging into the room. Metal suitcase in hand, he near jogged up until he was right in front of the transparent door.

"Kara's in trouble," His urgency plain in every syllable. "I lost contact with her moments ago. She's up against a powerful telepath. If you take her out quickly then you should be able to stop her."

Harry paused for a breath before answering. "And why would I do that?"

J'onn looked stunned for a moment. Harry couldn't blame him for being surprised. They had been working together for months and Harry was tired of the secrecy. He had made the mistake of letting Alex know that he had an inside source at the DEO (among other things). But he managed not to throw J'onn under the proverbial bus. He had captured every alien that he had been sent after. He had done everything that was asked of him, and now he was sitting in a cell because he was trying to force the DEO to stop looking for him.

Frankly, Harry was wondering why he was following J'onn's orders when he seemed to be taking all the risks, and still keeping secrets for him.

"She has made it quite clear that she doesn't want my help. And I am just a little over half a day from not being chased anymore. Why would I jeopardize that by leaving this sell to do you a favor?"

J'onn seemed to contemplate his answer for a moment before responding. "I know you don't consider yourself a hero. And you and Kara are far from friends." He began, the tension in his voice plain to hear. "But she is an employee of the DEO, and we are allies-"

"ARE WE?" Harry shouted spreading his arms wide. His frustration with this whole situation finally getting the better of him. He dropped his arms and took one step closer to the door. If J'onn was willing to make his involvement with the DEO public then he could let him out of this cell without consequence. But if he left this cell without being released then it could be construed as escaping custody and he will have endured this incarceration and interrogations for nothing.

So he looked J'onn right in the eye. He intended to convey that he was done working in secret. "Are we allies J'onn?"

They stare at each other for a few moments before J'onn gives an almost imperceptible nod of his head. Apparently having come to some kind of decision. Breaking their impromptu staring match, he moved over to the key pad of the cell and opened the door.

Once it opens he moves back in front of Harry and hands him the metal case he entered with. Inside he finds his gauntlets, the spiked collar containing his suit, and his helmet. Looking back to J'onn he sees him taking his own communicator from his ear and holding it out to Harry.

"We'll guide you from here." He says, resolute. "Go help my girl."

There was a flash of silver, J'onn blinked and when he opened his eyes the case and cell were both empty.

_o0o_

There it is. Things are starting to get interesting. Next chapter Harry and Kara have to find a way to work together to take down Psi.

I want to take a moment and apologize for the long wait. I wish I could blame it on a technical problem, or even real life getting in the way. But the truth is I was stalled. I kept getting stuck on the fight between Harry and Kara. But thanks to some help from my new beta I got past it and the rest of the chapter just took off. So take a moment and say thanks to War Sage for his hard work.

On that note I will leave you with a quote I hope to work into the next chapter: I hope I shall possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain what I consider the most enviable of all titles, the character of an honest man. Anybody who can tell me who said that, with out looking it up on the internet, will win a walk on roll in the next chapter. Peace and happy holidays.


	6. Chapter 6: I was wrong We're the same

Harry Potter is the property of J. K. Rowlings and Supergirl the CW. I own nothing and I don't make any money from this story.

Chapter 6: I was Wrong. We're the Same...

_o0o_

"National City Savings and Loan. Head for the parking garage." J'onn instructed over the communicator in his ear.

He moved with all haste to Supergirl's location, his silver lightning trailing behind him. He arrives at a mostly empty parking garage. Supergirl is on her back on the ground, staring up at the concrete ceiling. She had her hand over her heart and seemed to be trying to slow her breathing.

He was kneeling at her side, with his hand on her shoulder, in a second. She kept repeating, "I'm here, I'm here," as he was checking her over for injuries. Not that he expected to find any physical injuries after a fight with a telepath.

What worried him was how long it seemed to take for her to notice that he was there. Of course, once she did lock eyes with him she was less than pleased.

"What the hell are you doing here?" She near snarled.

"J'onn asked for my help."

"Its true Supergirl," Came J'onn's quick confirmation over both of their communicators. "I let him out of his cell." If the grimace on her normally pretty face was any indication, Kara was not happy to hear this.

Deciding that a change of subject was needed, Harry tried to get things moving. "Are you all right?" He asked as he rose to his feet and extended his hand to help her up.

She ignored his hand and got to her (unsteady) feet. "I'm fine, thanks."

Ignoring her rudeness, he got to the matter at hand. "What happened exactly?"

She didn't answer. Harry would have thought she was withholding information out of spite, were it not for the almost sheepish look on her face and she wouldn't meet his eyes. "We need to get back to the DEO. Now."

He winced at the sudden vice grip she had on his upper arm. "But you are not leaving my sight. Now come on."

_o0o_

Harry didn't enjoy being manhandled. Especially not by a Kryptonian who didn't seem to care if she dislocated his shoulder or not. 'Probably knows it would have healed by now if she would just let go.'

Although, his discomfort is offset by his enjoyment of the flight over National City. Before becoming a speedster flying was one of the things that made him feel alive. And while embracing his powers certainly did that, there was no substitute for soaring overhead with the wind in your hair.

Granted he was wearing his helmet at the moment, but that didn't lessen his enjoyment.

"OW," Harry exclaimed as they landed on the balcony of the DEO. Kara seemed to forget her passenger wasn't as sturdy as her. 'Either that, or she enjoys causing me pain.'

Looking through the doors they were greeted by a perculiar sight. Alex and J'onn were near the (now repaired) circular table. And they were clearly in the middle of a tense discussion. The various computer techs were discretely looking over their shoulders at the two of them. But the agents in the room weren't even trying to hide their interest.

Hand still in a vice around his arm, Kara dragged him inside where Alex and J'onn were waiting for them. Although, they seemed to busy yelling at each other to notice his and Kara's arrival. Kara seemed confused by this, but Harry didn't need to hear what they are saying to know what Alex seemed so pissed about.

"-shouldn't have done this behind our backs."

"I am sorry that I kept this from you." J'onn tried to placate Alex. "But given yours and Kara's attitudes towards him, I felt it was prudent to keep his involvement in DEO operations confidential."

"What do you mean 'involvement in DEO operations?" Kara asked when she was finally close enough. Her eyes shifting back and forth between her sister and adoptive father. Both of them turned to her at the sound of her voice. Clearly they were too engrossed in their argument to realize that they had returned.

With the tightness of her shoulders and the clenching of her jaw, Alex looked like she was barely restraining her temper. But she wasn't making any move to answer. No matter how furious she was with J'onn, she wasn't going to destroy her sisters entire view of him.

J'onn of course was his usually stoic self, but he didn't even hesitate to tell her the truth.

"Harry and I have been working together for the past several months." He began to explain. "I've been sending him after aliens that were eluding us, and warning him about the locations of operations we were conducting so he could avoid them. I've also given him access to classified DEO files so he would be better prepared for what he might be up against." J'onn paused at that point with a quick glance at Alex. Harry could guess what that meant. Alex knew J'onn and Harry were working with each other, but hadn't yet pieced together the most damning thing.

Harry wasn't sure J'onn was going to give any more details. Harry certainly wouldn't have blamed him if he didn't. As the head of the DEO he had the right to recruit Harry and their opinions on the matter be damned.

But as the surrogate father of these two amazing women, nobodies opinion meant more to him. As for being allies, Harry was satisfied with how far J'onn had gone at this point. He wasn't going to begrudge him this.

However, J'onn wasn't a man who did things by halves.

"And I'm the one who placed the tracking device on you the night we went looking for him at the zoo. I did so in an effort to warn him about our arrival." He finished.

By the time he had finished, Alex was looking at J'onn with the most wide-eyed and dropped jaw look imaginable. Harry wasn't sure what she was more shocked by. What J'onn had done, or the fact he admitted it. Kara's grip on Harry's arm had been getting more slack the longer J'onn talked. By the time J'onn had finished her hands were limp at her sides.

Kara couldn't look J'onn in the eye. Her lips were pursed, and her eyebrows were crinkled together. The muscles in her throat tensing like she was trying to hold back a scream, or keep in tears. Which one was anybodies guess.

Harry watched with a carefully schooled expression, revealing nothing of what he felt about the current topic. But his eyes kept moving back and forth from each person as they spoke, while making no move to interrupt.

Alex watched with sympathy as her sister tried to wrap her head around the truth. She wanted so badly to comfort her sister but she wasn't sure how. The closest thing either of them had to a father just admitted to secretly aiding the man that had cost Kara the man she loved. There wasn't exactly a 'get well card' for this.

Winn and James seemed to be of a similar opinions if the contrite looks on their faces were any indication. They had been slowly moving closer to the center of the room since they noticed Kara's arrival. But they were staying far enough away that they wouldn't be dragged into the argument, but still close enough that they could move in to offer support if needed.

It was only a moment before Kara finally spoke. "Why would you do that?" Her words were soft, almost gentle, but they held an undercurrent of steel. Her forced calm disguising the knot in her stomach.

J'onn however, was saved from having to answer by the least likely possibility.

"Because he knows that despite what you might think of me... I can help."

All eyes in the room moved to Harry. Kara jolted like she had forgotten he was even there. Nobody was expecting him to come to J'onn's rescue, but it was a welcome distraction.

"I know how you feel about me. You've made your feelings abundantly clear." He began, with some measured caution in his tone. "But regardless of how any of us feel about each other, you have no grounds to hold me. Your director has given his permission for me to work with all of you. And we still have a dangerous woman with telepathic powers on the loose in this city. Perhaps its best if we put this conversation on hold, and our petty differences aside, at least until we have her in custody."

Harry was careful not to mention the fact that this woman had already gotten the best of Kara twice, and she might actually need his help.

Jumping on this move towards business, instead of the personal, J'onn took command of the situation. "I am sorry that I wasn't able to hold her off. But she is more powerful than any psychic I have ever encountered." He began, speaking directly to Kara, who had managed to look him in the eye again. Her feelings unchanged, but her thoughts focused by the reminder that that woman is still out there. Literallyterrorizing her city.

"What happened this time?" Alex asked her sister. Clearly following J'onn lead.

Kara turned to her sister and managed to stumble through a, "it was the same as before." A comment that Harry didn't buy for a second. And if the long look Alex gave her was any clue, she didn't entirely believe it either.

Fortunately, (for Kara at least) Winn came forward with a timely distraction.

"We got our girl." He began, with much enthusiasm. "Gayle Marsh. Law abiding citizen of Skokie, Illinois until one day she snapped and went on a bank robbing spree."

Winn explained/rambled while they all moved towards the main monitor of the control room. Harry followed, but well behind everybody else. For the time being, he was hoping to stay unobtrusive, and thus minimize the tension in the room.

"Authorities nicknamed her Psi after a string of psychologically enhanced robberies that ravaged a series of small town banks throughout the Midwest a couple months ago." He finished from where he was leaning against a desk.

"Where do we go from here?" Alex interjected.

"Well now that we know more about her I thought I might start trying to adapt our psychic dampening technology to stop her."

"Good work Agent Schott." J'onn complimented Winn's usual good work. Which had the tech genius smiling like a loon. "But we still need to know how exactly she is infiltrating peoples minds. So get started."

"On that note," Harry began, reminding everybody that he was still in the room. "She likely won't rob another bank for a few hours, so I would like to take this chance to get something to eat, get a haircut and a shower."

"Permission to shower granted. In fact, I insist on it." J'onn answered, with his usual serious face before he walked off. Winn following behind him while trying not to look at Harry when Kara waylaid him with a quiet "I need to talk to you."

Forcibly reminded of the fact that he had been living in a panther paddock at the zoo for the last several months, Harry just stared ahead the whole time as they walked out of the room. When he was sure that they were gone he looked to Alex. "That bad?"

She hesitated for a moment before answering. "I wasn't going to say anything." Then she too walked off without another word.

With a whoosh and a flash of silver, Harry headed for the nearest locker room with soap and decent water pressure.

_o0o_

Later, while Harry was getting a much needed shower, Kara was just entering CatCo and was moving towards her desk. Her best friend Lena Luthor spotted her moving to sit down. Needing to enquire about her progress on the recent series of bank robberies, Lena began to make her way towards her friend, but paused mid step at the unexpectedly loud sound of Kara slamming her phone on her desk.

She stopped to watch as Kara took a pencil out of the orange holder on her desk. When the pencil almost immediately snapped between her fingers, Lena just raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow. She raised both eyebrows when Kara almost violently yanked the small trash basket out from under her desk, threw the pencil fragments into it, and near shoved the bin back under her desk.

Lena always thought of herself as a scientist first. Observe, understand, and act, in that order. That was her bedrock principle for any action she took. Having observed enough to understand something was very wrong with her friend, Lena came to the conclusion it was time to act.

"I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes." Lena began.

"What?" Kara snapped, before she turned and saw who it was that was speaking to her, and promptly felt ashamed. "Lena! I am so sorry." Kara rushed to apologize.

"No, its ok. I'm kind of glad its happening." Lena said with a smile as she leaned against her best friends desk.

Kara just looked at her confused. "I'm sorry, what."

"You... Kara Danvers are angry." Lena exclaimed with more flair than was necessary for just the two of them (clearly she was enjoying herself). It was like she was the main character of a James Patterson novel revealing the murderer. "In fact, I would go so far as to say you're pissed off."

Feeling appropriately contrite after hearing that comment, Kara tried to apologize for her attitude. "Lena..."

"Don't apologize. I said I liked it," Lena intervened, knowing her friends thoughts. "Its proof that Miss Sunshine actually is human after all."

Normally in a moment like this, when Lena unintentionally put her finger on Kara's biggest secret, Kara would be stuttering through an explanation or some kind of flimsy cover story. But after recent events, Paladin shining light on every crack in the foundation of her beliefs, Psi digging up every single fear she had buried since the destruction of her planet, and Alex still looking at her like she's broken... everything. All of that weighing on her, and the only thing she could think about as she hid her face in her right hand and laid her left on Lena's crossed arms was that her best friend had called her 'human.'

Kara didn't know if it was the unexpected fact that Lena 'liked' that she's angry or the irony of being called human, but something in that moment made her start to giggle. Soon she was laughing. Then she was laughing hard enough for her eyes to water. She knew she sounded a little manic, but it just felt good to laugh.

It took a minute but she finally managed to get herself under control. She inhaled deeply for a moment before letting out a long sigh and finally looking up at her friend as she dabbed at her eyes.

"Thank you." She said as she watched Lena's face soften. Going from joking to understanding in an instant, as only a friend can. She gave her arm a small squeeze before she let go. "I needed that."

Lena just quirked her lips in that half smile of hers. "Now you want to tell me what has got you so worked up? Preferably before you destroy more office supplies." Lena glanced down at the floor. Kara followed her line of sight and noticed the trash basket she had just shoved under her desk had fallen over and was sticking half way out under her desk. The pieces of the pencil she broke having fallen out onto the floor.

"Oh yeah, sorry about that." Kara apologized. "It just..."

Kara paused for a moment. Considering what she could say to Lena that would explain the situation without revealing anything she shouldn't. Sensing her hesitation, Lena tried to reassure her.

"Kara, you know you can tell me anything." Her voice had gone as soft as her eyes. Times like this reminded Kara just how good a friend Lena was. So deciding, as always, to be as honest as possible with her best friend, she just bites the proverbial bullet.

"Have you ever met someone who pushed all of your buttons?" She began, with no small amount of bitterness in her voice. "Somebody who, without even trying mind you, just managed to get under your skin. Someone whose presence made you want to..." Here she mimed wrapping her hands tightly around something and shaking it. Her tone of voice having gotten more tense the longer she spoke.

For her part, Lena just gave her friend a flat look while she pretended to strangle whoever she was referring too. Lena answered in a deadpanned voice, as if she couldn't believe she even had to ask. "You have met Morgan Edge."

Suddenly feeling more than a little sheepish, Kara put her hands down. She knew what Lena had to put up with as a woman CEO of a fortune five hundred company. Business men who looked down on her for being a young woman. Regular people who hated her for being a Luthor. Brilliant scientists who despised her for being more brilliant than them. Her own mother who hated her for her choice in friends (and a multitude of other reasons). Edge was just the most recent pain in her backside.

She had put up with all of that for years, and she did it with grace and poise. And Kara was acting like a brat after one conversation with Paladin. Realizing this she promptly felt ashamed of herself. "Right, of course you have."

"So who is it that has managed to 'get under your skin?" Lena quoted her, more than a little intrigued by the direction their conversation had taken.

"He's a new agent working at the DEO." Kara began to explain, her conviction clear in every syllable. "He should be locked in a cell with no chance of ever getting out. But instead, he's a government agent who is allowed to carry dangerous weapons." She of course didn't mention those weapons were metal claws.

"And you think he's dangerous to others?" Lena asked, with surprise and a small amount of alarm entering her voice.

"I think he's dangerous. And arrogant. And misguided. And trigger happy. And he sets a horrible example for how the other agents should act. And the worst part..." Kara stopped when she realized that she was again letting her temper get the best of her. So she took a deep breath and held it in for a moment to calm down before continuing. "And the worst part is that he wears it like a badge of honor. He put some people in the hospital and some in the morgue all without a shred of guilt, and he actually thinks he is doing the right thing."

As her friend fell silent, Lena's eyes began to move back and forth. Not really seeing anything, just a sign of her mind processing at a mile a minute. Kara said this 'new agent' was arrogant, trigger happy, and had already killed people. But he wasn't locked up. With the evidence available, the brilliant mind of Lena Luthor could only come to one conclusion.

"None of it was illegal." Not a question. But Kara chose to treat it like one anyway.

"No. It was excessive, but all of it was in the defense of others. So "legally" Here Kara made air quotes, "there is no reason he can't be an agent. But..." Kara wanted to keep pressing the issue, but her temper was finally running out of steam.

"But you're still worried about what he might do. That maybe he will eventually go to far." Lena finished her thought.

"He's already gone too far in my opinion. The problem is that from a legal stand point he hasn't done anything wrong. I don't know what to do." Kara dejectedly admitted. Having managed to impress upon her best friend her concerns about Paladin, her anger had subsided (for now).

"Well there isn't anything you can do. You're not an agent so you don't have any authority or pull as to what happens there." Kara dropped her head on her desk in despair. That wasn't exactly the warm reassurance she was hoping to hear.

"Having said that, I think you are forgetting one very important factor in this equation." A small glimmer of hope was the only reason Kara managed to lift her head up and turn a curious eye towards her friend.

"What factor is that?"

Lena's half smirk blossomed into a full smile now. She knew what she said next would make Kara feel better. "Alex."

Kara just crinkled her eyebrows together, not understanding where Lena was going with this.

"Alex is the most 'bad ass' of all 'bad ass' government agents. If you are this worried about this agent I'm certain that she is just as apprehensive. And knowing her, she is going to be watching him like a hawk. One with high resolution digital cameras." Finally Kara's mood began to lift, not just because of the amusing picture Lena had painted in her mind, but because she knew Lena was right. Her trust in Alex, in her skills and character, was deeper than her trust in Clark. And speedster or not, if anybody could put a leash on that guy it was her big sister.

"Your right. I don't know why I was worried." She joked. Her friends reassurance acting like a balm for her anxiety.

"Well, now that that is out of the way..." Lena began, her mood turning serious again, now that her friend was feeling better. "I need an update on your story about the bank robberies. Did you get in touch with my contact."

"Oh, uh..." Caught off guard by this change in the conversation Kara was sent scrambling for a response. Thankfully, she was saved by the sound of her phone going off. Seeing Alex's name on the screen she knew what it meant. "Speak of the devil. I should take this."

With a fond shake of her head, Lena just uncrossed her arms and waved her hands at her sides to say 'if you must.' Kara rose from her chair, as Lena turned to go back to her own office, and began to make a beeline for the elevator as she pressed answer. It wouldn't be until the elevator doors closed behind her that she would notice the way her heart had started to pound in her chest.

_o0o_

At the DEO. While the two friends were having their heart-to-heart, Harry had finished his much needed, very hot, very long shower. Even for a speedster washing away several months worth of panther paddock took a while. But now, after a shower, shave and haircut, he was feeling much more like himself.

Standing in just his boxer shorts in the DEO men's changing room, he was just putting his necklace on when alarms started sounding. With his usual burst of silver he was standing ready in the DEO nerve center.

He watched as Winn pulled up the security footage of another bank that showed Psi once again strolling in like she didn't have a care in the world. Of course, nobody in the bank was able to stop her.

"Where is that?" Harry asked immediately. J'onn, who had been standing behind Winn's terminal, turned from his observation of the security footage. Seeing who had spoken, he instead turned to Alex and began issuing instructions.

"Alex, call Supergirl. Inform her that Psi has surfaced again." He watched Alex nod in acknowledgement before he turned to a random agent passing by. "Agent Washington, give Paladin your communicator. Take it and pursue her. Mr. Schott will guide you from here. Supergirl should join you shortly."

Following his instructions, Agent Washington held his communicator out moved towards Harry. "Hi, I'm Nick." He introduced himself.

"Nice to meet you." He spoke quickly, propriety compelling him before grabbing the communicator and immediately started racing towards his target.

"Head west. National City Bank And Trust on 34th street." Came Winn's voice in his ear. At top speed it only took a few seconds to get there. He arrived in the parking lot outside. As he crouched behind the car on the far end of the parking lot, away from the front entrance, he could see inside the large windows of the bank. People were lying on the floor, some curled up in balls shivering and others lying motionless. Completely catatonic.

'It's the first time I've ever been happy a metahuman became a bank robber.' Harry thought with some humorous irony. 'As far as powers goes, at least she doesn't physically hurt anybody.'

Knowing she was going to follow the same pattern again, she should be walking out the front doors with two bags full of cash in her arms, in the next thirty seconds. "If I move fast enough, I should be able to knock her out quickly. Hopefully, before she realizes I'm here and can mess with my mind."

"That sounds like a good plan."

If anybody could see Harry's face under his helmet, they would see it twist into a grimace at the sound of Agent Schott's voice in his ear. He hadn't realized he had spoken out loud. 'This whole being monitored thing is going to take some getting used to.'

"You and Kara are so gonna take her down." Winn enthusiastically kept talking. But his words made Harry pause.

"What are you talking about? Kara isn't here."

"What are you talking about?" Winn near snapped. Suddenly he sounded worried. "Alex called her at CatCo Worldwide Media. She should have beaten you there?"

Harry didn't have time to ponder the missing Kryptonian as he saw Psi walking out the front doors. He was about to move to stop her, but she stopped just a few steps out the door. She cocked her head to the side like she was listening to a distant sound. Then a Cheshire Cat grin spread across her face and she turned to stare right at him.

"Somebody new has come to play." She said, almost to quiet for Harry to hear. She projected her next words much farther. "Come out little mouse, no need to delay. This cat just wants to play."

Realizing his cover had been blown, Harry shot out from his hiding place just as she sent a psychic blast at the car, shattering the windows and denting the side.

Harry tried moving towards Psi to knock her out but was forced to veer off when she sent another blast at him. He tried moving in again, and failed. Every time he tried to move in she kept forcing him back. And it was starting to get frustrating.

'She has to be getting bored with this game of target practice. I know I've grown tired of it.' Harry thought sardonically after his fifth failed attempt to get close to her. Unfortunately, Psi seemed to be enjoying herself.

It was his sixth failed attempt that the answer finally struck Harry. 'Maybe what I need is to give her more than one target.' With that thought, Harry changed his tactics. Instead of trying to move towards her, he began to rapidly move about the area around Psi. Across the entire parking lot and even on top of a few nearby cars, the whole time stopping for a fraction of a second before quickly moving on. Leaving an army of afterimages all around her.

At last, Psi seemed to lose the smile on her face. "Like the story of Hugi and Thialfi. We'll see which is faster, your feet or my thoughts." She called out before firing another blast at a speed mirage.

"This is not a story in Norse mythology," Harry hollered back. "Want to guess how I know?"

Harry shot at Psi's unprotected back as she turned to fire in the completely wrong direction. Being careful not to put too much speed into his punch, his fist met the back of Psi's head with a loud crack.

Standing over Psi as she lay knocked out on the pavement Harry spoke, "Thialfi lost his race with thought."

_o0o_

"I admit, I expected you to bring back a corpse. I'm surprised and pleased to be wrong." J'onn said as Harry locked Psi in the isolation cell. Winn had already rigged his psychic dampening tech inside and was setting up a more permanent system in one of the holding cells.

"Don't be too thrilled. The only reason I didn't kill her is because she wasn't a threat to people's lives." Harry responded as he closed the door to the cell. "As devastating as her powers are, she isn't a physical threat to people."

"Still your restraint is appreciated." J'onn began. A note of hope entering his voice as they turned to head back to the control room. "Perhaps its a sign. A sign that you can work with us."

Harry gave him a bland look. "Or its a sign that I only kill when I have too. I thought as a Manhunter you would know the difference."

"I never should have given you access to DEO personnel files." J'onn grumped, with a shake of his head. "Or at least not my file."

"Its all beside the point. She is locked up, that's what matters." He said before turning to J'onn and letting his temper show. "What I want to know is why I had to face her alone? Winn said you called Supergirl and that she should have been there before me. So why wasn't she?"

"We're on our way to find that out now." J'onn answered as he pointed at the catwalk leading to Alex's lab. Harry could already see Kara sitting on one of the beds, with Alex hovering nearby and Winn looking at something on his tablet.

As Harry Fell into step next to J'onn, they approached the door and began to here Kara's voice reaching them from inside. "-she must be getting stronger. I felt her in that elevator with me. She was- she was in my head again."

"There is no sign of any psychic intrusion." Winn informed her, with regret heavy in his tone, as J'onn and Harry stepped into the room.

"What?" With her back to them and her mind on Winn's words, Kara obviously didn't notice their arrival. Though Alex had, and for some reason her eyebrows shot up at the sight of them.

"I think you had a regular old human panic attack." Winn gently tried to explain. He knew Kara, and how she was likely to react to this theory. He knew he wouldn't enjoy this conversation. And Kara didn't disappoint when she displayed the stubborn streak found in all the Danvers women.

"Thats not possible. I'm stronger than that." Kara vehemently insisted. Alex opened her mouth to reason with her sister, but she never got the chance to utter a syllable.

"Oh my, aren't we posh." Harry interjected, announcing his and J'onn's presence. Winn subtlety leaned towards Alex to ask what 'posh' meant as Kara looked at him over her shoulder. Her eyes widening at the sight of him as her thoughts unknowingly echoed Alex's, 'Oh wow, thats what he really looks like!'

"And what do you mean 'panic attack?"

"Kara is there something you need to tell us?" J'onn gently probed.

"No there isn't." Kara answered before Winn or Alex could say anything. Rising from the medical bed and turning to face them with her arms crossed. "Because I didn't have a panic attack. I don't have panic attacks. I'm not vulnerable to things like that."

"Actually, you are." Harry continued. Winn and Alex looked to him and even J'onn seemed curious, and a little weary, about where he was going with this.

"While your skin may be as hard as steel, your mind is subject to the same thought processes and emotional insecurities as any human. Essentially, to her you are as vulnerable as any of us." He paused for a moment as he glanced at J'onn.

"With the exception of our resident telepath, of course." He said jabbing a thumb at J'onn standing next to him.

"No, she had to be using her powers on me." was Kara's vehement denial. Though Harry knew that wasn't possible. Psi was using her powers the whole time inside the bank, but she didn't notice he was waiting to ambush her until she came outside. And she only attacked J'onn because he was reaching out to protect Kara. That meant that her abilities had to have a limited range, roughly fifty feet. There was no way she could have attacked Kara from halfway across the city.

But Kara's pride apparently wouldn't allow her to acknowledge the truth. "I'm not that weak."

"Not that-. Not that-. Did you seriously just say that?" Was Harry's incredulous reply as he advanced on Kara. The others in the room growing more concerned as the tension between the two rose quickly as they came to stand only feet apart.

Finger pointing at her chest in accusation, his whole demeanor screamed outrage at her words. "Do you honestly think that just because you're Kryptonian that you're above psychological trauma? And you have the gall to lambaste me as arrogant."

"What does 'lambaste' mean?" Winn whispered as he again leaned towards Alex, and was again ignored.

"You are arrogant." Kara asserted as she pointed at him in return. "Especially if you think you can just walk in here and talk about me and my emotions."

"At least I have the strength to confront them. You're the one who keeps hiding from them." He snapped back.

"I'm not hiding from anything." Was Kara's almost desperate rebuttal.

Harry drew back like he had been slapped. Though he was careful not to show his surprise on his face. He had just realized the truth.

The waver in her voice, the way her chin subtlety quivered as she stared defiantly at him, and the emotional turmoil in her eyes as she fought to keep from shedding tears. It wasn't pride that was motivating this argument, it was fear. She was desperate, but not to hide how she was feeling from her friends and family.

'She's not lying to us. She's lying to herself.' And thats when he had a very bad idea.

Kara must have taken his silence as acquiescence. Because she stepped around him and out the door. Though she kept her face carefully guarded, her sister must have sensed Kara's emotional instability because she immediately moved to follow her.

"Oh bugger." He muttered.

He waited a moment for them to put some distance between them before he turned to leave as well. But not before patting J'onn on the shoulder and motioning for him to follow. Nobody really gave much thought to Winn who just stood there awkwardly for the whole exchange, unsure who to follow before he decided to check and make sure his psychic dampening tech was working.

_o0o_

Kara wasn't fair ahead of her, but with her anger fueling her pace she was right at the balcony threshold before Alex caught up with her. "Hey, are you ok?"

"Who does he think he is?" Kara growled. Still stomping towards the balconies edge.

'Wow, I thought she would want to talk about whatever is going on between her and Psi before she decided to rip into Harry, but ok.'

"I mean who is he to tell me how I feel about anything?" Kara ranted as they came to a stop on the balcony.

"Well, I think he-"

"J'onn never should have let him out of that cell." Kara cut Alex off as she started pacing with Alex standing still, just watching her.

"He didn't have a choice. Legally we-"

"And now he's strutting around the DEO like he owns the place." Kara continued, seemingly picking up steam. And that's when Alex realized what was going on at the moment.

"Oh I see. This isn't a conversation, you're just venting." Alex deadpanned.

"He probably thinks I can't take on one metahuman by myself. Like I'm afraid of her or something." Kara just kept going as she continued to pace.

Alex bit her lip in thought. Content to let her sister get this off her chest. Until she had an idea of how to have some fun while she waited for Kara to run out of steam. "You know, I could say pretty much anything right now and you wouldn't even hear me would you?"

"It's not like I couldn't have taken her down. He just got there first."

Alex just nodded to herself. "Scarlett Johansson came by Maggie's and my apartment and offered to have a threesome with us."

"And because of that, Paladin now has more reason to doubt my abilities as a hero."

Continuing with her private joke, Alex placed both hands over her heart, pretended to close her eyes in bliss, and said in her most reverential tone, "We said yes. It was glorious."

"And why the hell are we still calling him Paladin? Shouldn't somebody have gotten his name by now?"

Alex's eyes snapped open. Her joke forgotten in light of an uncomfortable realization. "Oh god. You weren't here for my interrogation and no ones told you."

"Told me what?" Kara stopped pacing and turned to look at her.

'Of course. That she heard.' Alex mused to herself. 'This is going to be an awkward conversation.'

"Well... we kind of... already found out... who he really is." Kara just tilted her head at her sister.

_o0o_

"Do you trust me?" Harry began without preamble as soon as he and J'onn were out of earshot of the lab. Looking over at the balcony he could see the Danvers sisters had stopped to talk. Kara could probably hear them if she were inclined to listen. But from the way she was pacing, she was most likely so angry the thought didn't even occur to her.

J'onn just stared at him for a moment. "I trust you." He paused. "To an extent. Why?"

Harry let that 'to an extent,' comment slide. He didn't fully trust J'onn yet either. Which is why he had to choose his next words carefully. Harry thought about how to explain this without telling J'onn exactly what his stupid idea was, because while he knew it would work there was no way that J'onn would approve. He knew what he would have to do, and braced himself for an attack of conscience.

"Supergirl is in trouble. I know you saw what I saw in there. Not to mention what Winn said about her having a panic attack." Tugging on J'onn's parental heart strings, Harry would be ashamed of himself if he wasn't so worried. But he knew it would get the job done.

"Psi rattled her. She dug something up that has Supergirl on edge. Now I think I know a way to help her deal with her issues but I need your help."

J'onn just stared at him for a moment. The silence and the look on his face was eerily similar to that moment back in the cell before J'onn opened the door. And once again, he gave a small nod and asked, "What do you need from me?"

"Wait an hour and then call Kara to meet me outside Psi's cell. And Don't let Alex or anybody else accompany her." That last comment had J'onn narrowing his eyes and giving Harry a measured look. "Why one hour? And why outside her cell?"

Harry matched J'onn's determination with his own. "Kara may not remember exactly what she dug up, but I'm betting Psi does. I need one hour to try and persuade Psi to tell me what that is."

J'onn just continued the unofficial staring contest while he tried to make up his mind. And Harry decided to give him one more push. "Kara and Alex, they aren't just your agents. You think of them like your daughters, correct?"

J'onn merely nodded, confused at the sudden left turn of the conversation. "Then as a parent, you know that some times what your kid needs is a pat on the head, and sometimes what they need is a kick in the cape." Harry moved a step closer to J'onn imploringly. "Which do you think this is?"

J'onn just stared at him for another moment. "Fine, one hour from now I'll call Kara and make sure Alex isn't there."

"Thank you J'onn." Harry said sincerely.

"WHAT"

The both of them turned to the balcony to see Kara and Alex staring at each other. Alex, wide eyed and leaning away from Kara, startled by her sister's sudden yell. And Kara's dropped jawed and totally stunned look as she turned to look at them through the glass.

Putting her odd starring on the back burner, Harry turned back to J'onn. "One hour. I'll be waiting." Before he walked off.

_o0o_

One hour later, Harry could be found leaning against the wall outside of Psi's cell. When he first entered she had asked him what he was doing there. Harry hadn't responded. In fact, he hadn't said a single word since entering the room. And eventually she had given up asking. Content to stare at him from where she sat on her cot.

He had been waiting there ever sense leaving J'onn an hour ago. He had entered the isolation cell just like he told J'onn he would, but he had no intention of negotiating with Psi.

He knew it would be pointless. J'onn would never agree to grant any incentives after what she did to Kara, and Psi certainly wasn't going to accommodate them out of the goodness of her heart.

Assuming she even had a heart.

Still, if everything went according to plan, he wouldn't have to negotiate with Psi at all. Now all Harry had to do was wait for Kara to show up.

'Not much longer now. I wonder how J'onn is going to get her here?' He mused to himself. He didn't have to ponder any further as the door opened and he turn his head to see Kara rushing in wearing her Supergirl uniform.

"Is she still contained? How did she get-" She stopped dead in her tracks. J'onn had called her minutes ago to tell her that Psi had gotten out of her cell and they needed her help. Flying over as fast as she could, she had expected to enter the DEO and find Psi on the loose and people on the ground completely catatonic.

Instead, she entered to find Harry standing to the right of the cell door (still closed and locked) and Psi still inside. In fact, she was just rising from where she seemed to be sitting comfortably. Not on the lose or attacking anybody.

"What's going on here? I got a call from J'onn telling me Psi had escaped her cell." Kara paused to observe how Psi's eyes were moving back and forth between the two of them like she was watching a play. Her intrigue at the situation plain on her face.

"Of course he did." Harry started, pushing off the wall with his shoulder. "Because I asked him to get you here alone." With that, he pressed a button on the control panel.

The feeling of a lead brick began to settle in Kara's stomach as she turned to see the door behind her swish shut and lock. Sealing her in a room with one enemy and one ... non-ally.

"What are you doing?" Kara asked as she turned back to them. Spreading her feet and squaring her shoulders, the tension was rising quickly. Despite Harry's relaxed stance.

Harry just looked at her with dejection. His conscience was gnawing at him like a wolf with a bone. He imagined Remus felt very similar to this when he started Harry's training in the patronus charm. Though this was considerably more dangerous than letting a boggart out of a trunk. Harry gathered his resolve.

"Believe it or not, I'm trying to help." Another press of the button, and the door to Psi's cell opened, and Winn's jury-rigged psychic dampening tech shut down.

"What are you doing?" Kara near shouted, far more urgently now.

Psi just calmly stepped out of her cell and turned to look at Harry, before a smile of candy coated cyanide spread across her face. "Thank you."

Then she hit him with a psychic blast that sent him careening into the far wall.

After his harsh meeting with the concrete he did not rise. He knew he had to get Kara and Psi to focus on each other. So he pretended to be knocked unconscious while he listened to the happenings around him. He heard Kara take a step, likely towards Psi, before he heard what sounded like a stumble.

Cracking one eye open he looked up to see Kara swaying on unsteady legs, with one hand over her heart and the other stretched out for balance. In moments she was having trouble catching her breath.

The whole time Psi just stood there watching her. And she smiled as Kara fell to her knees. Tears started falling from her eyes. Her eyes were open, but she wasn't looking at Psi. It was obvious that she wasn't in the room with them anymore.

"He's dead." She barely whispered. Her voice was small and quiet. "Its him in the pod. Not me."

'Oh god.' He thought with dawning horror. Raising his head and opening his eyes, giving up any pretense of being unconscious. 'That's whats been torturing her.'

Having heard enough, Harry jumped to his feet before another psychic blast slammed him back into the wall he had been lying against. Still on his feet, but his head and shoulders slumped and his back aching from the second hard impact in five minutes. Looking up, he saw Kara was on her knees, still lost in her own head, but Psi had turned to face him. The same twisted smile still on her lips.

"You didn't actually think I was falling for that 'play opossum,' routine, did you?" She condescended. "Now lets see what you hide in the dark corners of your mind."

Harry could feel her trying to effect him. Like wrapping her fingers around his brain and squeezing. But it was hardly debilitating. He had had brain freezes that were more painful.

"That's not possible."

Watching Psi's face go from smug to confused to concerned was strange. Mostly because he expected to be bombarded by images of his worst fears. The fact that he wasn't was both unusual and appreciated.

Lightning flashed around his irises for a second before he vanished. Narrowly dodging a psychic blast from the sadistic telepath. And in a macabre reoccurrence of events, Harry's fist again connected with the back of Psi's head, rendering her unconscious.

'At least I got to pay her back for the headache.'

With the telepathic bitch out of the way, Harry turned back to Kara. She hadn't moved from her place on the floor, tears still falling from her eyes. Harry kneeled down in front of her, but her eyes never moved to look at him, so lost was she in her own nightmare.

'Well you wanted her emotional walls to come down. Now its time to fix what you broke.' He mused to himself.

"It wasn't your fault." He tried to get her attention.

Kara just drew in a shuddering breath. "I killed him."

Harry exhaled deeply through his nose, gathering his thoughts. "I believe I'm the one who used the lead dispersal device."

Kara still wasn't looking at him as she spoke through quivering lips. "He's dead. I know it. I can feel it."

Harry merely observed as Kara finally confessed what had been tormenting her for months. The fears that she had been hiding, not only from those closest to her but from herself.

"So, the last daughter of Krypton is human after all." Harry began, his face carefully blank. "I was wrong before. I thought you hated me because we were so different. But the truth is we're the same." Kara finally looked him in the eye. "We're both broken." Kara just let out another shuddering breath. She just didn't have the strength to fight with him in this moment.

"You're going to have to get used to this feeling Kara. Because its never going to go away." A fresh wave of tears began to fall from her eyes as he spoke. She felt like someone was reaching inside her chest and squeezing her heart between their fingers. She wondered if he might be trying to hurt her even more than she already was, until he continued. "When we love someone enough to give them a piece of our heart, we don't get the privilege of asking for that piece back when they die. The pain may never go away, but it does lessen with time. A broken heart, even one made of steel, will heal eventually."

Sometime during his speech Kara did stop crying. His words actually bringing her a previously unknown form of comfort. But the way he spoke made her wonder. Of course she had read the books about his life, and (assuming they were accurate) she was familiar with all of his personal tragedies. But still, his words made her wonder if her situation might hit even closer to home than she knew.

She was just about to say as much when the door to the main hall opened.

"I got it." Yelled an excited Winn as the security door opened, admitting Alex, J'onn and several security agents into the room.

Winn apparently, had been fiddling with the exterior panel in an effort to gain access to the room. Probably from the moment Harry opened Psi's cell.

The door wasn't even fully open when Alex squeezed through the gap and made a beeline for Kara. J'onn though, went strait for Harry.

He grabbed two handfuls of the still kneeling man's suit, and bodily hauled him up. J'onn released him with a shove that was almost gentle for a Martian (but sent Harry stumbling back several feet).

"I trusted you." He snarled at Harry. Pointing a finger at his face, advancing on Harry like any pissed off father would. "I TRUSTED YOU. You said you were going to interrogate Psi. But this was your plan all along."

Harry didn't allow what he was feeling to show on his face. "Yes it was."

Alex, who until now had been more focused on making sure her sister was ok, finally looked up at them. Her face which had been soft with concern for Kara, began to twist with anger. Her jaw clenched, her eyes hardened into flints, and her normally pale complexion reddened with rage. She stomped past J'onn, right up to Harry, pulled back and sent a right cross impacting with his left cheekbone.

Harry saw everything in slow motion. But didn't even try to dodge the oncoming blow. He knew he deserved it. Alex really must have thrown her whole body into it, because it sent him staggering back another few paces.

She moved toward him again, and Harry just continued to stand there. He would let her exact her pound of flesh. But another blow never came. But she did plant both hands on his chest, and with a quick shove forced him back another step. And Harry realized that between her and J'onn's manhandling he had been (intentionally or unintentionally) maneuvered into Psi's cell.

Alex reached over to the control pad and shut him inside. Looking over her shoulder he could see the malevolent telepath had been fitted with some kind of headband and was being carried out by the security. 'This cell was only temporary. That headband is likely a more permanent form of psychic dampening tech.'

"You know I once defended you to my sister." Harry was pulled from his musings by Alex's voice. "I told her that you weren't a monster. Clearly I was wrong. You know, she might be bullet proof but you're the one thats made out of stone." Harry's pokerface never slipped as he and Alex stared at each other. "You will not go near my sister again. Or I'll make you regret it."

Kara, having already risen to her feet, was being escorted out. With J'onn on one side and Winn on the other. Both of whom had one arm wrapped around her shoulders like they were trying to help hold her together. Nothing more was said as Alex turned and stomped out after them.

_o0o_

Hours later. Harry wasn't sure how long exactly. He was still in the cell where Alex put him. He was still in human form, but the way he was pacing from one end to the other would certainly make anyone think of his panther form.

Alex's words had been ringing in his head ever since she stomped out of here. He knew that what he did was harsh. But somebody had to give Kara a wake up call. And history had shown that the people closest to her were all to willing to look the other way when she wanted to avoid something.

'What was my other option?' Harry kept asking himself. Not as a justification. He wasn't going to convince himself that he did it for 'the greater good.' He isn't that much of a hypocrite. But he really didn't see another way to break through the emotional wall that Kara had built. So what else could he have done.

"I hope I shall possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain what I consider the most enviable of all titles, the character of an honest man." He whispered to himself.

"That sounds like a quote." Harry's head jerked up to look outside his cell. Kara was standing there, somewhat awkwardly and trying not to look him in the eye. Somehow she had walked into the room and he was too lost in his own head to even notice. "Who said it?"

Harry paused for a moment, wondering what she was doing here. "George Washington."

Kara bit her bottom lip and nodded her head. "Its a good quote."

The awkwardness continued with neither Harry or Kara saying anything. Harry because he was waiting to see why Kara came to him. And Kara...well Harry didn't know why Kara was their, but he was getting uncomfortable with this particular silence. So he decided to take a stab at why she was there.

"Look if you're after an apology-"

"Thank you." She cut him off. And I sounded as if it cost her to admit that.

Harry's eyebrows jumped almost to his hairline, totally nonplused. "What?"

"You're not getting me to say that again." Kara snarked, finally meeting his eyes. "J'onn told me what you said. And you were right. I needed a kick in the cape. And while you could have picked a better way to do it," the look on her face, which had been a combination of unsettled and grateful, turned more stern. "I do appreciate that you did it."

Harry wasn't really sure how to respond to that. This wasn't the first time he had done something this outrageous, but it was certainly the first time somebody had thanked him for it. But being a proper British gentlemen (at least when etiquette wasn't getting in his way) he knew the appropriate response to a thank you.

"Your welcome."

Kara just nodded in acquiesce. Something neither of them paid much attention too, passing between them as she gracefully accepting his acknowledgment.

Then the awkward silence returned. They just stood there, on two different sides of the cell wall. Kara apparently didn't have anything else to say and Harry was just waiting to see if she was going to let him out of the cell or not.

His eyes started shifting between Kara and the keypad to the cell when his curiosity finally ran out. "So, are you planning to let me out or not?"

Kara just gave him a pointed look. "I know you can get out of there on your own. I'm not your maid."

Kara turned to leave and was struck with a sense of deja vu as his voice stopped her from walking out, again. "Yeah, but even though your sister didn't formally charge me with a crime before she put me in here, I don't trust her not to try and arrest me for escape if I leave without being released."

Kara turned with a huff and walked back the few steps to the keypad. Her finger hovered an inch from the release button but didn't press it to open the door. Instead, the corners of her lips rising in a puckish smile as she looked from the keypad to him. The finger that was pointing at the keypad turned to point at him before she spoke with mirth. "Are you afraid of my sister?"

Harry just stared at the smile on her face. Her dimples on full display beneath the rosy apples of her cheeks. "Just open the door."

"Answer the question and I'll open the door." She was enjoying this.

"Fine. I'll answer the question if you open the door." Relenting, Kara finally decided to take pity on him and pressed the button. As he stepped out and turned to face her. She crossed her arms just waiting to see if he would actually answer her question. And he did.

"Yes, I'm afraid of your sister." He ignored Kara's raised fist and triumphant yes. "She might be your 'Big Sister' but she has the whole 'Mother Bear' routine down perfectly."

Giggling as she turned to leave, with Harry trailing her, Kara couldn't help but comment. "Mother bear routine? That's what scares you? You're not afraid of the gun she carries around everywhere?"

Harry just held his arms out to his sides and said, "I'm a speedsters. I catch bullets with my bare hands. Why would I be afraid of guns?"

_o0o_

Well, that is chapter 6. I hope you all found it to be worth the wait. Especially those readers who messaged me and asked me if the story was dead, and you know who you are ;). I promise you I never left. Sadly I don't always have time to sit down and hammer out a few thousand words at once. But I make a commitment to try and put down at least a few lines every day. And I promise you that as long Melissa Benoist, and Chyler Leigh, and Katie McGrath (god I hope they don't make her evil next season) continue to wow us on Supergirl, I won't lose interest in my story. But that means that intervals between chapters won't be just a few days, sorry.

I'd like to take a moment to rant about the ending to Arrow. Now don't get me wrong it was powerful and action packed and dramatic and that final scene when Felicity went with the Monitor in the next life or another world, I got a little misty eyed. But as a series ender (or the beginning of an ender) it was very disappointing. I mean Arrow only has ten episodes for season 8, where apparently it ends with Oliver's death. And it sets up Star City for that post apocalyptic hell we saw all throughout season 7. Which means that everything Oliver went through, (his fathers suicide, his mothers murder, Thea's death and revival, the pain the suffering and the losses) it was all for nothing. He didn't get to reconcile with William. He doesn't get to see Mia grow up. He doesn't get to grow old with Felicity. He has to die to save every other earth in the multiverse but his own city goes to hell. To make matters worse, Emily Bett Rickards isn't going to be appearing in the last season. And last I heard they weren't even sure if they were going to write her in for the final episode. It just sucks. I was a fan of Olicity from the moment Oliver stepped into Felicity's cubical with a shot up laptop, and I wanted them to have a happy ending.

Moving on, if you are still reading this after my little rant let me say that next chapter will be out sooner. Mostly because it will just be a filler chapter while Kara is on Mars and therefore it won't be as long. Though I promise that you will learn a lot more about Harry in the next two chapters. But of course you won't learn everything just yet. I have to keep some things close to the vest for later chapters.

On that note I will say thanks to my betas War Sage and Kathryn518 and congratulations to guest 1000000 for being the first to id the quote as by George Washington. Good morning, good afternoon, and good night.


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